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Welcome back to Thank God It’s Monday!
tl;dr There are two types of people: those who allow life to “choose their hard,” and those who choose their hard despite life. Life is going to be hard, but solely surviving the challenges life imposes will feel like treading water. Instead, choosing your challenges intentionally to reach a desired outcome helps you grow more resilient and fulfilled.
Consider your friend group. You have a few friends who come to the table with similar “problems” time after time. Work stinks, their families stress them out, and they feel like something is missing spiritually, emotionally, or physically. But they haven’t come up with many solutions.
Then you have some friends who always seem to be working on something new. When you catch up, you talk about future events you’re excited about, new projects they’re working on, or new ideas they’re brainstorming.
The friends are both facing their own challenges, but one is treading water, keeping up with the inevitable problems life will present. The other is also dealing with challenges, including the same life problems, as well as the ones they create for themselves to become who they envision themselves to be.
Overcoming challenges (and failing) intentionally to reach a goal is a large distinguishing factor of people who feel fulfilled and those who feel like something is lacking. I’m not saying one is easier than the other: they both face real challenges. But failing, learning, and moving on to new problems creates integrity and resilience in a person.
They’re all difficult courses of action. So how do we do the hard thing (to be fulfilled and grow as a person) when it’s much easier to, well, do the easy thing and coast?
The first step in the art of doing hard things is envisioning the goal. We don’t create more work for ourselves unless it helps us obtain some sort of gain, maybe monetary, physical, spiritual, whatever it is. We can picture the life we will have if we overcome that specific challenge, so it excites us to take on the work.
The idea of this new, ideal life gets us to the peak of Mt. Stupid, as demonstrated in the Dunning-Kruger effect. We start taking small action in the direction of our goal, see some traction, and think our goal is within our grasp. That is, until we arrive at the precipice of a sobering realization.
Beginner’s luck and momentum wear off, and we arrive at the valley of despair. This was going to be a lot more hard work than we realized, and maybe more than we are realistically willing to commit to.
This is where the first mass of people quit. The hard work that was initially not so bad because of the exciting vision we carried, now becomes a dreadful commitment without a clear end in sight. Is it really worth it? How long is it going to take? Maybe staying the same isn’t all that bad. Back to ordinary life problems they go.
The art of being consistent despite it not being fun is the first huge hurdle that, once crossed, makes it significantly more realistic that we will conquer the hard thing. Can you do the work for the desired result? Even without knowing how long it will take, how you’ll overcome it every day, and how you will get there.
Figuring out how to minimize the effort to progress in the right direction helps increase the chances of success. Finding accountability helps keep us honest. And keeping the vision of the desired outcome clear and close can help when things feel impossible.
When you master consistency, then you start climbing the slope of enlightenment. You start seeing some tangible results, gain momentum, and feel a resurgence in your drive to do the hard thing. This fuels your consistency, makes the hard days a little easier, and puts your goal back into reach.
To clarify, this doesn’t mean it’s smooth sailing from here. There are still plenty of challenges that make us feel defeated and unsure. But now, through consistency, we have built integrity so we can trust that we do what we say we’re going to do, even when we don’t know what the outcome will be. And this persistent action, regardless of the consequences, in an intentional direction towards our goals, will help us reach the plateau of sustainability.
See, the goal of doing hard things is not that we will find it to be easy; it’s that we feel more confident in ourselves, courageous in our attempts to fail and persevere anyway, and fulfilled by our work in our purpose.
Or, be like the friend who just keeps complaining about taxes, their job, and their circumstances.
Life is going to keep challenging us. Whether we take the initiative to create our own work in pursuit of something greater than ourselves is completely up to us as individuals.
How can you do hard things to create the life you envision for yourself?
If you found some value in this, please share it with a friend you think would enjoy it! And let me know if you’d like to be added to get TGIM.
This week, my podcast recommendation is from 10% Happier with Dan Harris, “Anxiety Narrows Your Brain. Here’s How to Widen It Back Out with Susa Talan.”
With that, happy June!
Until next time,
Shannon
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