Photo by Roman Melnychuk on Unsplash
People will only be weighed down when considering obstacles as troubles. With a shift of perception, they can see challenges as opportunities leading to growth.
Life and challenges go hand in hand.
They coexist with the latter, flourishing the other and making it more meaningful and worthwhile. For every challenge, there exists an equivalent lesson and a sense of fulfillment that will only further motivate people to push through. This is why they say that to feel fully alive, everyone will face obstacles, and they must choose to overcome these to elevate their experiences.
However, people can only carry and overcome so much in life.
Regardless of the purpose these bring, challenges can still be exhausting and frustrating. They can knock people down and drag them around until they’re covered with wounds and bruises, gasping for some relief. Yet, unfortunately, these will still be perpetually present despite the consequences. They’re a requisite in life, an ever-existing aspect necessary for growth and progress.
Hence, people can’t avoid them when they’re expected to face and experience them bravely. Instead, they must change their internal narratives and perceive challenges as opportunities.
Learning To Embrace The Inevitable
Life is sprinkled with obstacles.
While it can be inherently beautiful, its downsides still exist. Deeply engraved in aspects of society and even in the nature of men are traits and factors that make life challenging. Whether it’s due to natural reasons or simply from men’s thought processes, these are inevitable – a common and essential part of life. People are left with two options: either they perceive these challenges as opportunities and learn to embrace them, or they evade them, likewise eluding chances of growth.
In choosing the latter option, people already succumb to the circumstances even before they occur. They vicariously feel defeated from the beginning until the end, even before seeing the situation.
This is only when they succumb and are conquered by loss.
In Encouraging A Friend With Our Trials by Jamie Pulos-Fry, the author writes about a consequential accident that changed the passage of her life. Perhaps what they say about near-death experiences and their ability to improve people is true. With a singular car accident, Jamie’s sense of mortality became apparent, and she’s thrust to treasure her days, making every second worthwhile.
What she experienced is a prime example of the challenges life throws at people, and how she handled them should model how people should approach theirs, too. Hers may have put her in more fragile and detrimental conditions while others would experience subtler and more obscure equivalents. But this doesn’t equate to being careless in the face of challenges.
Like Jamie Pulos-Fry, people should perceive their challenges as opportunities to improve life. This doesn’t mean they have to turn theirs upside-down. Instead, they must view these obstacles as a means to reflect on their current circumstances and consider what needs to be changed.
Perceiving Challenges As Opportunities For Growth
Nobody has control over what comes in their lives. While they may have spaces to avoid troubles by always choosing the safest options, this may also compromise their development.
However, seeing obstacles in a brighter light can be easier said than done. This requires more effort and practice and a more profound sense of internal reformation regarding their perceptions. People’s change in attitude may take more than proactively taking this stance. Instead, they must nurture the belief that this perception will consequently influence their lives.
In seeing challenges as opportunities, people must choose to perceive the positives in these obstacles. Although they may naturally focus on the negatives as a defense mechanism, they must also nitpick and zero in on the advantages. This is how they must shift their focus. Take time to examine the challenge ahead. Explore what happened and why it did, and consider what can come out of it.
The answers people will obtain from these inquiries can help them identify opportunities they’d get out of these challenges. These will help them move forward and see the silver lining of what they’re going through. After all, if people focus on the negatives, then that’s all they’ll see. But if they pivot their attention, shifting to more positives, they’ll be more open to growth.