When life is spun around by circumstances, benign or otherwise, how is it that some people flail, while others sail? Why do some of us wallow in that place where we’re so shocked and unhappy about an unexpected turn of events that we resist reality and find ourselves absorbed in bitterness or fear or hopelessness? Instead of accepting change with grace, we dig in our heels and suffer through each day of things not being what we think they should be. What’s the secret to accepting change gracefully—regardless of whether it deposits you gently on the beach or wallops you down to the sea floor?

The funny thing is that as a culture, we seem determined to celebrate change. “Change is good,” we tell each other, and,”Everything happens for a reason.” Thoreau himself said, “All change is a miracle to contemplate.” Yes, we praise the virtues of change religiously—until some unwanted, unscripted change occurs. The smallest nudging out of our routine can send us into a tizzy, while big disruptions send us into therapy.

How can you learn to accept change with equanimity, absorb each phase in stride and learn from each new experience?

The answer may come from dealing with change in four distinct stages.

Loosen Your Grip

When any change occurs, there’s an overwhelming feeling of losing control, and that’s perfectly normal—and also perfectly delusional, says Herdis Pelle, a teacher at the Berkeley Yoga Center in Berkeley, California. “We’re moving into unknown territory,” she says. “Deep down, we’re never in control.” If you stop grasping for control of the uncontrollable, you can learn to breathe through it all.

Of course, just as you can dread change, you can also overly invest in it.Eagerness for change may look like the flip side of resistance to it, but really it’s another vain attempt to control your circumstances. You may think that change is going to be miraculous and solve all your problems,however you may find that the best way to approach change in your life—wanted or not;is to neither fear it nor think it’s a cure.

Separate Your Feelings

Once you’ve accepted your utter lack of control, it can still take some doing to accept the emotions that often accompany a sudden unraveling of your expectations. Even minor setbacks challenge us. However you can learn to separate your feelings from your response to them. By distinguishing your core emotions from those that pile on afterward, you don’t limit your emotional life; on the contrary, you unclutter it. It’s the clutter that leads you away from your true experience and into cloudy territory.

Mitra Somerville, a teacher at the Integral Yoga Institute of New York in Manhattan, says that to recognize in the midst of radical transformations, the Self remains stable is key. If you can come to an understanding of this;through asana, breathwork, and meditation; you can soothe the discomfort brought on by external changes. “The yogic thinking is that there’s part of us that’s unchanging; the spiritual part of us that has peace and joy and love,” he says. “The nature of the world, however, is in flux.”

Tap Into Wisdom

Learning to make peace with life’s calamities—lost jobs, romances, dreams—does not mean you have to be passive.Sometimes we try to bring change into our lives rather than just be with sadness, anger, or anxiety, we want to change it.This inability to sit with what’s happening is duhkha, suffering.

But does that always mean choosing inaction? What about when there are wars to resist, house fires to flee? Are you meant to be happy about any old change of plans that comes along? “If we listen to our hearts, in that deepest silence we will be guided toward the appropriate action,” says Pelle, who agrees that certain events require out-and-out protest—and that yoga helps you know which ones.

“We practice so that we can be guided from within,” says Somerville. In stilling your thoughts, you free up a more reliable inner wisdom. “The more peaceful your mind is, the clearer and stronger your intuition is, and the better able you are to make the proper decision.”

Expect the Unexpected

Prepare for life’s ups and downs with a daily practice.

Accept Impermanence: Every morning take sometime and repeat this gatha(mindfulness verse): “Great is the matter of birth and death; impermanence surrounds us. Be awake each moment; do not waste your life.” Allow your action to come from the situation, rather than from a false perception of what’s happening.

Practice Mindfulness: Come back to the present moment. The Buddha points out that you can be happy in a pleasant situation, but then it’s all too easy to lose yourself in the pleasure.

Take a Breath: When faced with a change, pleasant or otherwise, try to tune into your breath, and how your feeling in your body. Tuning into your breath gives you time to respond better to an unpleasant situation.