Challenges are just a part of life.

If you really get to know any successful person, their story is filled with ups, downs, and unbelievable obstacles that you cannot imagine.  One of the cornerstones of success is just having the bandwidth to deal with any obstacles in your way.  Just like an athlete needs to have physical endurance, anybody that wants to go after their dreams needs to have emotional endurance.

Whenever I read or learn about somebody’s journey to success, I’m always inspired by their challenges that they had to deal with.  You would think that this would be discouraging.  However, it’s nice to know that everybody goes through challenges.

Develop your own sense of emotional endurance.

There is a difference between getting stuck dealing with day-to-day obligations or challenges and dealing with the challenges that will get you to amazing success.

Rise above everyday challenges and deal with challenges that will have more payoff.

When I started writing I assumed that I needed to be honest by sharing every single thought and every single emotion.  But, now I realize that I can be nuanced with my words and convey my message without airing out all my feelings.

With the abundance of communication tools and ways to instantly publish, it’s easy to express every single emotion, every single time.  When we are cut off on the freeway or encounter a rude person, it’s easy to text our loved ones or even post it on social media.

Before smartphones, we had a cooling off period where we could honestly put everything into perspective, and most of the time after assessing our initial emotions we realize that the situation or offense was not that bad.

But now some people want to air out all their prostrations and all their dirty laundry in front of others to see.  This can be unhealthy because what you put out in the world matters.  You attract what you put out in the world.  There are...

Let’s face it, most people are not going after an amazing life.

 Why?

It’s challenging.

Many would rather engage in distractions that don’t get them very far or even be detrimental.

Success takes work.  And, oftentimes the work needed to succeed is boring, tedious, frustrating, scary, and other negative emotions.  The brain is a very defensive organ that wants to protect us from threats and discomfort.  So, instead of focusing on the challenges ahead, we distract ourselves by taking actions that make us feel good in the moment rather than put us back on a more productive path.  This is one of the challenges that every successful person takes.  Examples of this can be focusing on other’s flaws rather than focusing on our own.  Wishing life would be different than changing our own lives.  Putting the main focus on something else rather than laying out next steps.  Re-litigating the past instead of accepting,...

  I have been studying personal development for over twenty years.  Recently, I wanted to understand human behavior and how it affects success.  I have found that it’s easier to embrace natural human tendencies rather than go against them.  When you go against human nature and human tendencies you are adding one more layer of challenges.  The goal should be not to work harder than you need to.  The goal is to be as efficient as possible because you want to save your energy for bigger and bigger goals or just to ultimately enjoy life.

1.   We are social creatures. So much of conventional wisdom is surrounded around the idea of being independent and forging our own path.  This comes from our natural pushback that we had during our childhood.  We fought for our independence from our parents or nagging teachers.  However, this does not serve success.  We are all influenced and encouraged by somebody else.  We...

A couple of weeks ago, I took my first trip in two years and it was amazing.  I have a disability and COVID added a couple more layers to my life.  The most tangible example is putting on and, more importantly, keeping on a mask.  Even though it’s challenging for anybody, it was more challenging for me. If the mask falls off, I need help getting it reattached to my face. Basically, it is one more thing I need help to do which is emotionally taxing for me. 

I was never comfortable enough to travel during the height of COVID because it just felt unsafe.  However, recently, I began to feel that now it was time.  Although the last two years were challenging, it feels like we have turned the corner.  It was nice to see people, be close to them, and not worry.  Instead of being frustrated about what was taken from us, I was just grateful that we got it back.

It was nice to be in a group, talk to others, and just be.

I was reminded that...

When life gets challenging or tedious, it’s tempting to focus on events that are out of our control. It’s easy to worry about what’s going on in entertainment or around the world.  While it’s important to be up to date and fight for humanity, you have another job.

Your job and your purpose is to improve your life and the lives of people who you interact with.  This can be your family, your community, pursuing professional goals, and even making the cashier laugh.

Focus on improving your life.

We all have ideas of what it takes to succeed.  We also have societal and cultural narratives around success.  Hard work, having passion, always trying one hundred percent, and overcoming obstacles are all examples of common assumptions about what we need to succeed.  Oftentimes, people talk about the intangibles of success.  To me, every intangible can be explained with a little nuance and some deeper thinking.

While it’s challenging to argue against hard work, what does “hard work” really mean?  Hard work can only take you so far.  There are plenty of people who work sixty, seventy, or even eighty hours a week, but they work on the same thing all the time and are not growing themselves.  Taking a few of those hours and putting them into personal growth or skill development or making new contacts is much more valuable.

Having passion can hurt.  Passion is defined as an uncontrollable emotion.  What is often...

In early 2020 we heard rumblings and stories about the coronavirus.  We had no idea of what to do with the information.  However, two years ago in March, we all had to face reality.  Around March 10^th, which is my wife’s birthday, it all hit home. We had to face reality.  There was a pandemic.

Story after story made this pandemic real.  In no particular order, Tom hanks tested positive, the first NBA player tested positive after mocking the reporters, the league then postponed the season. This all culminated with the shutdown.

Personally, I went to the Apple store and saw that it was almost empty.  My family cancelled a Persian New Year celebration.  I was planning to go watch my friend speak in San Diego, which got cancelled.  My sons were planning to go to school online.

For the first few months, we were all in a haze.  We did not know what we could and could not do.  We were spaying down everything.  Every time I would...

My disability provides many minute-to-minute challenges in my life.  There are some activities I can’t do without help.  There are  some activities that take me more energy.  There are some activities that take more time and more money.

I always felt awkward calling my life hard.  I have amazing people in my life.  I grew up and live in a bustling part of California.  I have never experienced hunger, abuse, rejection, and other hardships in my life.

The word “hard” implies that something is complicated, cumbersome, and limiting.  The word “challenge” has a slightly different connotation.  It means something that you can take on, something that has more of a path, something that has rewards at the end.  So often human beings mistake hard with challenging.  When you assume something is hard, you assume that it will stop you.  When you assume that something is challenging, it’s easier to...

There are so many ways that people describe going after your dreams.  Chase your dreams.  Finding your truth.  Living out your purpose.  The world is a playground.  Most of the way people describe their dreams and the way you go after them is to describe what you want and somehow it will come true.  However, a more realistic approach is to follow your dreams.

Life is like a negotiation.  You have some idea of what you want and if you are willing to listen, or do the necessary research, you can find out what you need to do in order to accomplish your goals.  It is not wise to unilaterally decide what you are going to do, make vague assumptions and think that is all that is necessary to get to your goals.  Any goal you have someone else has accomplished or at least some version of it.

Follow your dreams does not mean that you ask the universe exactly what you want and somehow a magical path will reveal itself.  The path will reveal...