An Excellence Wknd [25.15]
Some thoughts on problems as portals
Hello, hi, 👋
Good morning from snowy southern Maine, & a big welcome to the 29 new folks who have joined us in the last week.
Let's get into it.
🗓️ THIS WEEK
Why Your Motivation to Get Fit Might Be Your Biggest Obstacle
Talking with Mark England about how our relationship with fitness often stems from unhealthy mindsets & self-talk.
21-Day Focus Challenge: From Awareness to Action
A systematic approach to strengthening your focus through deliberate practice & awareness.
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🤔 SOME THOUGHTS
Stop Trying to Eliminate Problems. They're Here to Help.
There are annoyances, inconveniences, & problems.
An annoyance is when the internet is running slow. An inconvenience is when it goes out for a bit. A problem is when a tree falls & knocks down the power lines.
It'd be strange if we reacted to the slow internet like we did the fallen tree, right?
Yet, that's precisely what we do when faced with problems. We treat them like annoyances or inconveniences.
We try to huff & puff them away or look for shortcuts. We think life unfair, ourselves unlucky, & the problems themselves unnecessary.
But problems aren't annoying or inconvenient. They're useful. (Which is nice since they're not going anywhere.)
An actual problem is an opening - a portal to wherever we’re trying to get next.
Not making enough money? That's a portal to becoming more valuable. Stressed out all the time? A portal to examining where your attention is going. Overweight? A portal to asserting more agency over your time & effort.
But if we lump problems in with annoyances & inconveniences, we're unlikely to see them as openings.
Instead, we'll try to make them go away or ignore them or complain ourselves into resigned indifference.
To keep growing, then, we need to:
Recognize that problems will always exist & stop hoping they'll go away.
Begin to distinguish between the many inconveniences of life & the few essential problems worth solving.
Understand there's nothing wrong with minimizing inconveniences or annoyances, but myriad issues crop up when we try to do the same to problems.
Embrace the identity of being a problem-seeker & problem-solver.
If we can do these things, we'll see that our ability to solve ever-greater problems creates opportunities we can't even imagine.
🙋🏽♀️ QUESTIONS
Do you have a question you'd like us to address in a future episode? We'd love to hear it!
Ben & I are talking “worthy challenges” on Tuesday’s episode, & on Friday, how to know whom we can help.
Until then, keep on chasin’.
⛄️ Patrick