Category: Problem Solving

…We all do.

And the ones who make it appear as though they don’t or like they don’t have nearly as many as others—still do. They just approach “problems” differently. Here’s how:

1. They solve them. It’s easier now more than ever to avoid, suppress, and distract yourself from problems… those who don’t—the ones who turn towards, confront, and attack their problems—get ahead. If you’re having relationship problems, for example, and a hard conversation is needed… the ones who bite the bullet and have it… get to move on.

2. They exchange them. Not all problems need to be solved. In fact, some problems are better off not being solved and are better off being exchanged for different problems. Why a stranger on the internet commented something nasty on your post, for example, might not be the best use of resources to try and solve. You may be better off dropping that problem altogether and exchanging it for another one… like what gift you can create and post next that’ll add a ton of value to a different internet stranger’s life.

3. They upgrade them. Too many people wait for the promotion in life before they start learning how to solve the next level of problems. When it’s often the case that learning how to solve the next level of problems is precisely how you get the promotion. Figuring out how much change to give someone all day doesn’t have to be it for you… you can start learning new/better skills—the ones your bosses have—and upgrade your way into higher and higher roles… the ones that have better, more interesting problems for you to solve.

Today, the martial arts school I teach at closed due to weather.

In the spirit of creativity and resilience, we created a Martial Arts Snow Day Scavenger Hunt for the students to do at home with their families.

We’re quite proud of the idea and expect it to lead to some great memories.

The weather might be outside of our control and it may even ruin our plans… but, nothing is stopping us from controlling what’s inside of our control and unleashing the full creativity of our minds at the obstacles in our way.

After all, the obstacles are the way.

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Inner Work Prompt: What’s a creative solution you came up with that solved a problem caused by forces outside of your control? What’s a creative solution to a problem you’re currently facing that’s caused by forces outside of your control?

I try to write ideas down as they occur to me so I don’t forget them.

When I have a bunch of ideas oriented around the same topic, I’ll purposefully back-burner them all and let them simmer.

…Which is exactly what I did when I was trying to pick my focused goals for 2024.

A good signal that an idea might be worth pursuing—above the others competing for your time and attention—is you can’t seem to get it out of your head.

…It keeps resurfacing on walks, during commutes, in the shower, inside conversation, and even while you dream—in an unprompted fashion.

This is a sign that shouldn’t be ignored.

Not even if your conscious mind has more rational ideas about how you should act on your ideas. Because what it means is that your unconscious mind has picked.

And there’s a depth of understanding and insight that the unconscious mind references that the conscious mind only gets to touch—it’s the drop in the ocean vs the ocean itself.

And it would be wise to trust—and at the very least consider—what that deep wisdom is saying.

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P.s. Dreams are NOT arbitrary. Dreams are a primary means of communication. Not convinced? Read this.

Life only gets in the way if you’re unable to maneuver around the obstacle(s) it puts in your path.

Once you learn how to turn your life’s steering wheel, suddenly, life doesn’t get in the way so much as it gives you opportunities to build steering skills.

What might turning your life’s steering wheel look like?

• Doing a light stretching session when getting sick stops you from doing your regular workout.
• Playing an audiobook during your commute because you overslept and missed your morning reading.
• Practicing intermittent fasting when traveling because you know the options on the road are going to suck.
• Cancelling a weekend obligation to spend more time with family when work kept you late on a weekday.
• Immediately starting a rainy day fund where you save 10ish% of each check to help cover big, unexpected expenses like a broken down car, vet bill, or hospital visit.

As wonderful as the straight, unhindered path might sound—it’s the curved, obstacle-filled path that builds skillful life drivers.

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P.s. Today I crossed 12,000 insights uploaded to my quote library…!

When I first started building MoveMeQuotes.com in 2010, I was all about fancy and cool.

…Until speed came onto my radar as being a vital component of a search engine friendly website.

When I first started speed testing my (fancy/cool) website… I was pulling 15+ second load times.

…Which was/is AWFUL.

Thus starting me on the journey of simplification, optimization, and code cleaning… which eventually lead me to AMP.

AMP is a protocol that essentially strips your website of all complex code and boils it down to its most essential/clean version.

The problem is it often strips your website of so much code that it often breaks the site—like buttons, forms, comment section—nothing works breaks… like, bad.

But… if you stick with it and diligently fix the code, rework your layout, download the right plugins and get clever about how you do things… the benefit is lightning speed.

I opted in, spent hundreds of hours getting it to function properly as an AMP-based website, and eventually got it loading sub-second.

The problem was the ongoing work never got easier. Everything kept taking 5x more work than it otherwise should’ve/would’ve and simple things like allowing comments were ongoing issues.

But, I always kept my head down, put in the 5x more work, and told myself the speed was worth it.

This weekend, however, I finally decided to challenge that belief and reverted back to an updated (faster) version of an old website-theme I used to use.

And lo-and-behold… sub-second load times.

The lesson today is this: challenge old beliefs from time-to-time. 5x more work might not be the current reality our old thinking is making it out to be.

Remember from a few days ago when I said, if it can go wrong it will?

Well today I got a flat tire while driving.

I was 16 minutes away from home, 35 minutes from my mechanic, an hour out from changing it myself, and several hours out from getting the car towed/fixed/back on the road.

None of these were convenient options.

…When is getting a flat tire ever convenient though, eh?

Very fortunately for me, just as I was rolling up my sleeves to change it myself… I saw a car shop just down the road.

I slowly drove there and they very kindly got me patched up and back on the road within 30 minutes.

It couldn’t have been a more ideal situation for a thing gone wrong.

This is a rarity, though.

Usually, things only continue to complicate after the initial inconvenience. Which is why I’m suggesting, yet again, you meditate on solutions to things that could very possibly go wrong in your life. Some starter ideas:

• Flat tire with no cell reception… do you know how to change it yourself?
• Lost your phone and all the information on it… do you have a backup?
• Your basement flooded… are really important items stored off the ground?
• A pipe burst and water is spewing everywhere… do you know where the main shutoff is?
• Somebody breaks into your home and steals the five most valuable things laying out in the open… do you have a safe?

While it might feel inconvenient or unpleasant to reflect on this now… imagine how much more inconvenient and unpleasant it’ll be when you have to figure it out after the fact.

I’ve been using this new floss lately that rips every… single… time.

It’s so incredibly frustrating.

At first, my thinking was that it was me… and that it was I who needed to treat the floss more nicely.

After all, floss is supposed to be designed specifically not to rip, eh?

Welp, not this floss.

…Must’ve missed that kind of important step in the design process.

Fast forward a few more flosses and ripping became the unavoidable pattern—regardless of how careful I was in navigating the crowded spaces between my teeth.

My first attempt to make this awful experience less awful was to treat it like a game: will today be the day I make it all the way through my mouth without a single rip?!

And once I realized that game was impossible to win, rather than revert back to pure frustration… I came up with another idea… one that’s been working ever since:

I started expecting it to happen.

Which, doesn’t sound like a revolutionary mindset change, but here’s what it did:

• It evaporated my frustration because I was no longer surprised.
• It gave me the new strategy of starting off with extra long pieces of floss so I could finish without having to re-pull and re-wrap my fingers (sometimes multiple times).
• Which, by and by, allowed me to get the job done in less time.

If there’s a similar situation in your life that, no matter what you do or how you do it, it still seems to result in the same incredibly frustrating outcome…

Maybe simply expecting it to happen… and planning for that… is an option worth exploring moving forward?