Embracing the Obstacles

"Life is like a roller coaster, it has it's up's and down's" how many of you have heard that? Do you ever feel like sometimes the down's never end, and the up's are never long enough? Ultimately, your roller coaster life is your ride, and you can't get off. So no matter how curvy or fast or up and down hill it gets, how do we manage to hang on while still having fun?

It's easy to fall into the woe-is-me trap of feeling overwhelmed and bogged down by the ever-present demands of life. "When it rains, it pours" is another fun one when it seems like you can never get on top of the things being piled on to your plate.

I used to find myself in that situation. I would stress myself out and get such bad anxiety by dreading the list of things to do. I would look at the down hill of the roller coaster and think "there's no way I'm going to survive this." That's when I realized: the ride is happening, no matter what I do or how I react, the ride will keep going. I can choose to close my eyes and pray and cry that it ends soon. But that's when I realized, it's my choice! If I'm going to be stuck here anyway, I might as well enjoy it. I can choose to throw my hands up instead, and scream like hell, and laugh from sheer terror. At least then, at the end of the ride, I could say that I had a good time; and the good time was my choice, even if the route of the coaster was not.

The same could be said about many of our obstacles in life. How often do we look at the red lines in our budget, or the endless list of house tasks, or problems in our relationships and think "I'll never survive this". And that thought alone is enough to consume us. The more we have a perspective of "I can't do this" it turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy, and you end up down a spiraling rabbit hole of "I can't".

I know it sounds cheesy when people say "your perspective matters" but it's true! If you keep telling yourself "I can't" or "I'll never" then that's exactly what is going to happen. So what if you changed your perspective? What happens if you start to say "I can" instead?

There's so much power in embracing your obstacles. Here's the truth of it: if you look at your obstacles and say "I can't do it" then it's your obstacles that now have power over you. They have the power to control your anxiety, the power to control your time, the power to control your mindset. If we were to switch the narrative and instead say "I got this!" Then you will have embraced your obstacles and taken your own power back. You now have power over the situation, simply by taking ownership of it. The red lines in the budget? I got this! Let me find a way (no matter how small) to save a little, or make a little more every month. The house tasks? Bet! I've got those with no problem, just one at a time! My relationships? I will handle those as the situation calls for it!

I can navigate and take ownership of all the things I need to balance in my life. In doing that, I take my own power back. These things no longer have control over me, I have control over them.

Shift the perspective: obstacles are not barriers, they are CHALLENGES. I encourage you to rise to the challenge. You can do anything you set your mind to, but it all starts there: in your mind. Your perspective matters. You got this! Challenge accepted!