We Don’t Need to Have Resources to Be Resourceful
How we can get through hurdles and adversity to achieve our goals in 2021
I watched a documentary many years ago where the boss of a telecommunication company in Hong Kong tries to get through a day without a phone and live like a grassroots, unemployed person.
The CEO realised that he couldn’t leave his phone number to the potential employer after an interview. This frustrated both the employer and him, an employment opportunity slipped away. At the end of the show, he decided to do something within his abilities to help poorer people.
The society operated on the basis that a person can do anything with resources and help. We often laughed at rich kids who started a company “from stretch” when their family’s connections give them a competitive edge from the beginning.
We then look at ourselves, just like fashionistas look at their wardrobes, and feel like we have nothing.
Do we need to have sufficient resources to start building our lives? Do we need to have a phone to find a job? Why do we always feel we haven’t got enough?
When I was 16 years old…
I took my first solo flight with a big suitcase and moved from Hong Kong to England. I didn’t have a local phone contract so my phone was pretty useless (let alone it was a time when there’s no data or wifi in your phone).
I arrived at Heathrow Airport around 5 a.m. and there were heaps of people speaking in many languages. I was supposed to find a sign with the name of my new school on it, but that was nowhere to be seen. Have I got to the wrong terminal? Was I supposed to drag this big luggage to find the person with a sign?
I was scared, frustrated and I waited for four hours. Anxiety built up in my stomach and I needed to do something. So I took the £20 banknote and exchanged for many £1 coins.
I rang my mum in Hong Kong, who was paranoid as I disappeared for hours. I asked her to look up the telephone number of the school. But no one answered! Then I saw a few Hong Kong girls giggling in Chinese. I took up the courage and went up towards them. I asked if they know anything about my school. Turned out among all the different groups of school kids with international arrival on 1 September, I picked girls from my new school.
There were a few other new girls from Hong Kong attending the same school and I was the only one travelling by myself. I suddenly felt quite proud. I realise I can sort things out on my own, I am resourceful. This marked the beginning of my adventure abroad.
What does it mean to be resourceful?
A resourceful person is a person with a positive attitude and wit to utilise what you have to get what you want. It’s not about how much we have already got.
In fact, people with the most resources are often the least resourceful because they are used to things they need being available to them. There are people who can paint with a pen and one colour, but there are people who can’t paint with all the colours in the world. It’s about how to use something for our own benefit.
The summer before I flew to England, I worked in a restaurant as my summer job. I deliberately bought a phone because I remembered that TV programme I mentioned and thought I needed one so that my employer can call me.
I used the internet at home to apply for a few jobs, but there wasn’t any response. So I took my phone, went to a shopping mall and asked for work directly. Restaurant after restaurant, I was rejected many times, until a manager took me in. He thought I was quite brave as a young girl, and asked me to come tomorrow lunchtime.
I didn’t take out my phone once. In fact, most of my part-time hours were agreed the day before, so they never ever needed to call me.
The moral of the story is not whether we need a phone to get a job, but what should we do when we don’t have the resources. This is why success stories of people from a humble background are always fascinating, they transform from lack to abundance like pure magic.
You can change your mind and become a resourceful person.
Based on my personal experience and observation, resourcefulness can be cultivated. It’s like a habit and a mindset that you can develop. Here are my top 5 tips on how to become a resourceful person:
1. Think positive about limitations.
It’s like the glass half full mentality when we see a glass of water, do we immediately think it’s half-empty? Shift our focus on what we have, the half-full part of our story. Rather than seeing I didn’t have a phone to call my mum at the airport, I saw the payphone and the £20 notes in my pocket.
2. Enjoy the challenge of creation.
If we are glass-half-empty people, we get frustrated by the lack easily. Frustration leads to de-motivation, then we can’t get through hurdles with rationality and confidence. It’s better to be stoic rather than optimistic or pessimistic about life — those are redundant emotions I dare say.
Expect bad things to happen, accept challenges will come one after another. Then your mind is equipped and ready to get on with life and sort out problems.
3. Really look into what you have.
I particularly enjoy watching Youtube videos where the artists challenge themselves to paint with only one or two colours, cooking with only a few ingredients, or even doing full face makeup with one lipstick (yes it’s possible). Our limitations force us to really see the potential of what we have got and experiment it in different ways.
My English was really bad many years ago, what else can I use to communicate with my British classmates? Unlike many people I know who stuck with people from their own background, I went all out. I hung out with them even if I had no idea what’s going on. I put on makeup like the Brits do and went to house parties. Some embarrassing things happened, but it’s all minor events and fun stories to jokes about now.
4. Trust people.
It’s quite mad for a Londoner to say we should trust people, considering most of the time we walk around with extreme caution. But I still believe we can trust people, and we can show our vulnerability to them and ask for help.
Our society is getting more and more individualistic, we don’t knock on our neighbour’s door and borrow stuff anymore. But I trust my friends and I also help them. After I got my summer job in Hong Kong, a friend asked me to help to get the same job, I did that. A few years later, she helped me to get a paid internship when I was poor AF after university graduation.
A resourceful person doesn’t “use people”, but we reciprocate. Let’s be authentic and generous, even at the time when we feel we have the least.
5. Don’t make excuses.
From time to time, people ask me for advice. There’s one type of people I dislike chatting to, the ones that whatever you suggest, they immediately tell you how that plan’s not going to work.
Say if a young person asks you for advice on their future career. I suggest this job, and they might say but that job needs this qualification; then I suggest the other job, they might say something negative about it. Honey, if all you want is easy, then my best recommendation is being a waitress. Then that person will say, but that pays so little.
These people come to me because I have made interesting and unexpected transitions in life (more on that another time), and they find it fascinating. But when I give them practical suggestions, they make up excuses to block them from going forward.
They aren’t even conscious about it, it’s a mental habit. It’s a harmful mental habit! Visualise your goal, then write down what you need to do to get there. If you don’t know, research. Then research again how you can do what you need to do, then do it. Informed yourself, don’t just speculate then write off your ideas with excuses.
Life is short, like really short.
Time is not lenient nor objective. True that we all got 24 hours a day, but how we use every minute and how we feel about each minute is different.
Many people who put off their life goals because they feel inadequate or whatsoever, will also waste further time in regretting life and feeling lost. This is why some people achieve a lot from a young age, and some people live a life of regrets.
If you are lost, ask the basic question of what, why, how, where, when, then research the answers. Then when you have got some answers, start making it happen.
Don’t be proud of the ideas in your head then walk around miserably because you don’t have the resources to make it happen. Start making it happen.
Some further reading by me for you:
