Monday Motivation 4/24/2000

Most of us have problems of one sort or another.

For some of us, the problems in life are of our own design. We actively work on cultivating our problems day to day. We cherish our problems. We relish them. We wouldn't know what to do without them. Sure, they're troubles, but they're our troubles.

Like our vices, we would eliminate our problems if we just didn't get so darn much mileage out of them.

Others are confronted by problems not of our making. The problems are those of disease, family troubles, a new boss, a new job, or a piece of valuable machinery that breaks down.

Either way, the prescription to fix those problems -- address those challenges -- is the same: confront them.

Shakespeare wrote it like this: "To be or not to be - that is the question. Whether 'tis nobler to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of trouble, and, by opposing them, end them"

We've heard that passage so much that we probably don't pay it much attention. Let's decipher the last part in modern-day speech: "Is it nobler to be the victim of our circumstances and problems, or to confront them, and by confronting them, end them?"

In our "victim" society, it's all too easy to dismiss our problems. It's ever easier to relish in them. We "suffer" from this problem, or we "struggle" with that one. We "are a victim of" one trouble, and we ask for people to "understand our struggles." We actually address few of our problems -- and fewer still do we ever manage to put behind us.

Most of the time we choose to live with our troubles, when with a bit of work, we could put our problems behind us. We simply refuse to even stop and address others of our challenges -- with them, we are defeated from the start.

"You can overcome anything if you don't bellyache," said Bernard Baruch.

Problems are a part of life, and challenges are what makes life worth living -- but that doesn't mean we should cultivate our problems.

Let's decide to solve our problems -- let's choose to confront them, but them behind us, and grow in the process. You rarely see new territory when you follow the same old roads, you don't attain personal growth by doing what's comfortable, and you won't grow if you don't try to constantly improve.

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