 September 3rd 2008
 Personal Development
 4 comments
Welcome to the second part of my guide looking at how to deal with obstacles in your life. As discussed in the introductory post, you will come across obstacles on a regular basis. They can be anything from a minor technical problem affecting the performance of your computer, to poor tone of voice holding back your relationships with your friends. Whatever it may be, there are three ways of dealing with it, which are covered below. With some obstacles, all three measures can be used, while with others only one approach is appropriate.
Avoid it
One of the options is just to avoid the obstacle. Don’t want to go to loud, heaving party? Then don’t go. One of the simplest approaches to avoiding a problem is to delegate it to somebody else. This doesn’t just apply to work situations either. I’m not very comfortable with getting a waiter’s attention in restaurants so I will often let my wife do it (is it me or this a common trait with married couples?). One could argue that avoiding problems regularly will lead to a pretty bad habit in the long run. However, there are many obstacles in life we simply can’t avoid, and by rationally avoiding those we can, it saves us wasting our time and energy. Apply the 80/20 rule. Is it an obstacle worth tackling? Avoiding somebody you don’t like rather than going through an emotionally draining course of trying to resolve the enmity would arguably be the better approach in certain circumstances.
Resolve it
Perhaps the most standard option. It involves actively working on the obstacle (specifically, what is causing it to be an obstacle for you), with the aim of making it less of a problem or removing it as an obstacle altogether. The specifics of resolving such scenarios is far-reaching and could cover several blog posts of their own. However, the fundamental basics are to think proactively and rationally, and lay down good foundations for whatever you do. If you are a smoker struggling to quit and you keep frequenting smoky bars, it doesn’t take much rational thinking to deduce a positive step you can take to make things easier. It is very much like developing habits (indeed, many obstacles are often created by bad habits).
Live with it
Sometimes we have to be realistic, and accept that we are just going to have to live with certain obstacles. Busy traffic during the morning rush to work is a common example. Despite our best efforts at resolving such problems they won’t go away or get easier. You may have tried to heal a rift between you and your boss but she stubbornly refuses to reciprocate. At least you were proactive in facing the problem. It might seem defeatist but this is far from true. The key to this stage is acceptance. You’ve identified the problem, faced up to it, learned from it, but the obstacle remains. At least you can gain peace of mind and not be that person who continually moans about their problems without doing anything about it.
Reader discussion
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Love. The. Post! I was trying to get at something similar in managing information (email and RSS). Get fewer, get faster, and get control. Cheers!
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Glad you like the post Matthew.
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Hi James, one thing that I tend to do when I get stuck in traffic to help ease the pain is listen to the radio. This calms you down and lowers your stress level.
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