My daughter is getting to the age where she is very particular and has strong opinions about what she wears. As much as reasonable -- a measure I am constantly trying to determine -- I want to encourage her to express herself creatively and authentically. Where we often clash around wardrobe choices is how to dress based on the weather. Today I insisted that she needed to wear pants or shorts appropriate for the weather, and not what she originally picked out. While she eventually complied on her own, she made a spectacle of putting her shorts on. She fell to the floor, got her feet stuck multiple times, twisted and turned, put them on backwards and had to start over. Something that she could easily do in less than a minute ended up taking several frustrated minutes.
When we are invested in an activity we enjoy, we effortlessly remove barriers, distractions, and make sure we have everything we need to order to accomplish our goal. When, however, we are faced with a task that we do not want to do, we become experts at setting up roadblocks and barriers, we find excuses and justifications for avoiding the unwanted task. It feels impossible to get started, and even harder to make progress.
When we watch a child dealing with an unwanted chore or request, it is so clear to the observer that they are making it harder on themselves than it needs to be. But when we find ourselves in the same scenario, it is more difficult to see the situation clearly. If we find ourselves attempting to do something that feels hard or even impossible, we can learn to look for signs that perhaps we are making it harder for ourselves than it actually needs to be. If we can shift our perspective to that of an observer, we can more clearly evaluate the situation to determine how difficult our task actually is and if it is even necessary based on this framework:
The task is difficult, but not necessary. It is not actually something we need to do. If I asked my daughter to put on pants that were difficult to button just because I liked them better, she would be justified in her frustration. When you find yourself in this scenario, consider why?
The task is not difficult, and not necessary. If you find yourself in the middle of a task that you have already made harder than it needs to be, it can be easy to get tangled up the task itself. But if you can assume the role of the observer and find that the task isn't even something you want or need to do, it becomes easier to just let it go.
The task is difficult, and necessary. Doing this thing is necessary in order to achieve something that is even more important to us. If it were snowing outside, and I ask my daughter to put on layers of snow gear, it would be difficult, but important in order to keep her from getting sick. Sometimes we need to learn a new skill in order to accomplish a goal. What tools or resources can you leverage in order to make a difficult, but necessary task easier?
The task is not difficult, and necessary. This brings us back to where we started. I asked my daughter to change her outfit because keeping her healthy is more important than stylistic choices. As the observer, I could see that she was intentionally making it more difficult than necessary to change. In this scenario, as the observer you can identify the end goal or the deeper value that you are working toward. By keeping that motivation in mind, we can more clearly see how boring or annoying tasks or temporary discomforts are necessary for our greater purpose, and we can work through challenges with greater ease.
When we find ourselves faced with a task that seems too big or too complicated, or when we are in the middle of something that seems to only get more and more difficult to do, use that as the queue to step back and objectively observe the situation. Then it becomes easier to stop wasting your energy and attention needlessly, and instead focus on learning a new skill, leveraging a resource, aligning on your values and goals, or just letting it go.
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