Are you tackling a challenge?
Life is a series of challenges. Every day there are obstacles to overcome. One of the key traits that separates the successful business owner from the unsuccessful one is the ability to tackle – and defeat – challenges.
Tackling challenges means meeting them head-on. You have to engage them, not shy away.
Today isn’t about wallowing in what’s not working. Today is about pushing your way through what isn’t working. Don’t get stuck inside your own head, trapped in a stagnant way of thinking. Don’t give in to low motivation. On the other side of the bullshit in your way is a resounding “Yes!”
Success is a muscle; resistance only helps it to become stronger. Resistance helps you and your business to become stronger.
Know your purpose
Challenges cannot be overcome without context. You need to understand exactly why you’re doing what you’re doing. Whatever it is that motivates you – that big picture “why” – is what will get you through. And the bigger your “why,” the easier the “how.”
There are two questions you need to ask yourself in order to tackle a challenge effectively:
- “What do I want to get from tackling this challenge?”
- “What of myself will I bring to tackle this challenge?”
The reward
Human beings are not as complex as we like to think. We are motivated by rewards. The complexity comes in the nature of the reward.
What will you get from tackling this challenge? How will it benefit you? Tackling a challenge might garner trust or acceptance from another party, or from your customers and clients. It might mean growing your business, increasing your income, or opening new opportunities for personal or business growth.
When you identify the reward, you give yourself a why – a reason to continue to push through.
Your resources
Everyone has their own unique strengths and gifts. Your personal strengths and gifts are the tools you use to tackle a challenge. To do so, you need to recognize the tools you have in your toolbox.
It might be that you have valuable experience that will unlock the solution to what you’re going through today. It might be your knack for creativity, or your care for others. It might be your organizational abilities, or intellectual gifts. It might even be a natural curiosity, the ability to listen well or simply inspire.
You can only bring the tools you have. The good news is that challenges rarely have only one solution. There is the highest probability you have the tools to tackle the challenge; you just need to identify the right tools for the task.
Know when you’ve won
In business and in life, it’s often hard to see the forest for the trees. You can get caught up in minutiae and not even realize you’ve already won.
To succeed, you need to know what winning looks like. You need to be able to say something like this:
“Today, with this challenge in front of me, life looks like this,” and then identify the problems caused by the challenge. Then you say, “Tomorrow, once this challenge is behind me, things will be better because …” and you identify the specific measurable changes that will take place by tackling the challenge.
You need to clearly define the “win.”
Not all wins are equal
Success isn’t a single point in time; it’s a series of milestones. Accordingly, there are times when you tackle a challenge but the outcome isn’t as awesome as it could be. You may achieve only part of your goal.
You still need to recognize this as a win. Whatever your obstacle was, it didn’t defeat you. You faced it, and you’re still standing. There are times when even a “failed” challenge is still a win, because even that failure allowed you to move forward. New York Times best-selling author John C. Maxwell describes this process as “failing forward.”
Failing forward is still a win.
Coming back to why
It’s not enough to know what winning looks like. You have to remember what that win does for you. Trust. Acceptance. Growth. Opportunity. Income. These are the benefits that go along with the results of the win. If the results of the win don’t produce these benefits, it’s not truly a win, is it?
What’s stopping you?
What keeps you from tackling that challenge? What’s standing in your way today?
It could be you’re afraid of failure. Maybe you’re anxious about the outcome, or even the process of tackling the challenge. It could be that you’replagued with procrastination.
Yet, we know that these kinds of fears are irrational. We know that procrastination can be simply a bad habit – yet another challenge to overcome. Fear and procrastination become secondary challenge, compounding the problem and turning a relatively simple 40-yard dash into the 400-meter hurdles.
These obstacles have a price. Just as tackling a challenge has benefits, surrendering to obstacles has consequences.
If you refuse to tackle the challenge, the fear and anxiety will only grow. Your business will stagnate. You’ll be stuck in a cycle of negativity, defeat and the status quo. The best you can ever hope for will be to do almost as good as you did the day before.
Your good ideas will stay ideas (at least until someone else has the idea and overcomes their obstacles to make it happen.)
Winning looks good on you
On the other hand, when you consistently tackle your challenges and overcome them, you’re going to start achieving your goals. A win that isn’t implemented is no better than a loss. You have to take advantage of the new position you’ve gained by winning, and use it to your benefit.
You also have to learn the lessons that come with winning. It’s often been said that the wise person learns from their mistakes. While this is true, studies suggest that we learn more from our successes than our failures – if we’re willing to let them teach us.
So, what are you waiting for? Figure out why you need to face this challenge, pull together the right tools, and turn the obstacle into a win today.