Find Meaning in Your Obstacles

There’s no way around the fact that you will run into obstacles in life.

This isn’t a bad thing though. The people we remember are worth remembering because of how they overcame adversity.

If you have the right perspective, obstacles are just opportunities in disguise. They represent a chance for you to rise to the occasion, grow in character, and expand your skill set.

Of course, it’s not easy to adopt this mindset in the moment. It’s easier to complain. Your circumstances are unfair, other people who are where you want to be didn’t have to deal with the same obstacle that you do.

Maybe not, but they had to deal with their own. Getting into a contest to see who the biggest victim, the least advantaged person is doesn’t help anyone.

What helps is a decision to find meaning in your obstacles and to find a way to overcome or transcend them.

A Matter of Perspective

I love this powerful quote from the book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking by Susan Cain:

Unhappy people tend to see setbacks as contaminants that ruined an otherwise good thing (“I was never the same again after my wife left me”), while generative adults see them as blessings in disguise (“The divorce was the most painful thing that ever happened to me, but I’m so much happier with my new wife”). Those who live the most fully realized lives — giving back to their families, societies, and ultimately themselves — tend to find meaning in their obstacles.

One of the things we’ll talk about tomorrow is the fact that you get to choose the narrative of your own life.

The facts never change, but how you view them can. In the divorce example that Susan Cain brings up, the facts are the same in both sentences: someone went through a difficult, painful divorce. The first quote is an example of someone who chooses a narrative of defeat and wallows in self-pity, the second is someone who chooses to fully acknowledge the pain, but to move own.

Same facts, different story. You get to make your own choices, therefore you get to come up with your own story.

It’s difficult now, but the fact is that success wouldn’t be sweet if it weren’t difficult to get there.

This is the twenty-fourth in a series based on my article 30 Lessons About Life You Should Learn Before Turning 30.