Desirable Difficulties
Remember the phrase Desirable Difficulties the next time you are shaking your head and thinking, “Really? Why me?”
Malcom Gladwell’s latest book, David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits and the Art of Battling Giants, explores the questions: Do we have an accurate understanding of advantages? Can the things that appear disadvantageous (like having dyslexia or losing a parent at an early age) be catalysts that open doors to personal victory, not in spite of the difficulty, but because of it?
Of course! My work brings me in regular contact with people who are transcending challenges, moving through transitions, endings, and exits. They then go on to experience happiness and new levels of contribution.
Obviously, deliberately exposing ourselves to a demoralizing situation that fosters feelings of inadequacy has zero advantage. But, Gladwell makes a case for the endurance, intelligence and courage ignited by hardship that compels us to rise to an occasion and do “the impossible.”
Twelve U.S. Presidents (including Clinton and Obama) lost their fathers at an early age. A disproportionate number of über-successful entrepreneurs, like Richard Branson and Charles Schwab, are dyslexics. Steve Jobs was adopted and never graduated from college.
In my experience, successful people don’t think of themselves as disadvantaged. Consider journalist, Gwen Ifill. Recently, when she spoke as a part of the Marin Speaker Series, an audience member asked, “What prejudice have you experienced as a black woman in male-dominated Washington?”
In response, Ms Ifill shared what happened to her when she began her first job as a news researcher decades ago. Some anonymous coward left a note on her desk saying, “I’ll be damned if a (insert the N-word) is going to take my job.” And, do you know what her first response was to the note? “I wonder who they’re referring to?”
Being black and female did not live for Gwen Ifill as a disadvantage, it was simply who she was. She credits her parents for never saying, “you can do anything you want, even though you’re black or female.” They did foster hard work and confidence, but never damned her with the weight of cultural bias. Society took care of that soon enough.
How does this relate to Honorable Closure? Step One of my 4-Step process is to Tell the Old Story in a New Way, transforming “distress stories” into “medicine stories.” At one time or another we all experience unwanted change and adversity. The shape of the game changes; we are then free to see things newly and try things no one else (including ourselves) has ever dreamt of. We can shake off rigid or limiting notions about what an advantage (or dis-advantage) looks like.
If you are in one of those periods right now, ask yourself, “How might this situation work out better for me, even if I can’t see it right now?
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