Are You Moving in the Right Direction?
Facing adversity
Recently, adversity and overwhelming situations have been common themes with my peers. These ambitious folks, who are striving for success, meet challenge after challenge that are seemingly intended to knock them back. I faced a similar situation myself last month.
I am upskilling on some pretty technical stuff in my work and hitting wall after wall as I try to learn what is blocking my path. These challenges have left me frustrated and at times thinking I am not skilled enough for my job. Then, as I faced mounting despair and was in need of affirmation a couple miraculous things happened.
The first was that I serendipitously started working with one of our software engineers, Aarush (not his real name) on another project. Then he volunteered to help with my next one. This was my chance, I asked him about my issue, and he offered to sit with me for an hour (which became 90 minutes).
We met to see if we could troubleshoot the problem together. As we were working, I asked him questions, confirmed my understanding, and even pointed out some missed steps. “Wow!” I thought, “ I had learned more about this technology than I had initially thought.
While we didn’t solve the challenge on that day, he took it away and worked on it over the next week whenever he had time.
During that week, I had some big accomplishments: I successfully delivered a new training, initiated a couple of cross-department collaborations, completed one slow-moving project, found an actionable solution to another, and even received praise from one of my teammates about helping to promote one of his initiatives.
By the end of the week, my engineer friend got back to me with the solution to my problem as well. Boom! I couldn’t have had a better week if I had planned it myself. Who would believe it all started with a feeling of despair?
The difference between my situation two weeks ago and at the end of this week were night and day. So what changed? Well, I only did one thing differently — I reached out instead of retreating in.
There are definitely times for introspection. Times when we need to be alone with our thoughts and take inventory of the situation. It is important, in those times, to spread out the pieces of our hot mess across the table. This allows us to see what we have.
Once we do that, we need to start assembling the border, just like a jigsaw puzzle. When the border is put together, we should reach out for the knowledge and experience to fill the gaps.
We are surrounded by many wonderful people with various skill sets who can provide a fresh perspective. They can ask us the right probing questions to help us discover the answers within ourselves. We need to take advantage of those resources to overcome our challenges. The trick is choosing the right people.
One of my mentors, badass Mike Lee Kanarek, identifies three types of people — drainers, maintainers, and propellers. In short, drainers are the people that suck our energy. They focus just on what they want. Maintainers will cheer for your success. and may even help you along the way until you become more successful than they are. Then, maintainers do what they can to pull you down and disrupt your world. We see examples of this in sports all the time. People cheer the underdog, but many loathe the superstar as being too good. Finally, the pot of gold at the end of your rainbow is the propeller.
Propellers want you to succeed with no thought or concern for themselves. Aarush is a propeller. He continues to do what he can to help others succeed. I like to think of myself as a propeller too. I am constantly looking for the good in others and considering how I can help them to achieve. When you have a propeller in your corner, do what you can to keep them. These people make all the difference in your life. Reach out to them with your issues and let them help you. Doing so will help you to get out of your dark space and bring light that reveals the route to success.
There are people in your life that do care about you achieving the success you desire. They want to help. All you need to do is reach out. Whether it is asking questions or presenting your dilemma and talking through possible solutions, propellers will be there for you provided you keep doing something to move yourself forward. We propellers will, however, move quickly away from those people who find joy in constantly complaining and the people who do nothing about solving their own problems. Don’t be that person. Embrace life’s challenges.
In conclusion, once you have an understanding of your problem, not the solution but just the context, reach out. Rely on your support network. Utilize the positivity of the propellers in your life to lift you out of the doldrums and provide a fresh perspective, getting you moving in the right direction. You don’t need to go it alone. There are rooms full of people ready to support you. All you need to do is ask.