May 11, 2022
Quotes from TED Talks
A series of odd jobs may indicate inconsistency, lack of focus, unpredictability. Or it may signal a committed struggle against obstacles.
But if your whole life has been engineered toward success, how will you handle the tough times?
But on the flip side, what happens when your whole life is destined for failure and you actually succeed?
As I met successful business people and read profiles of high-powered leaders, I noticed some commonality. Many of them had experienced early hardships, anywhere from poverty, abandonment, death of a parent while young, to learning disabilities, alcoholism and violence. The conventional thinking has been that trauma leads to distress, and there’s been a lot of focus on the resulting dysfunction. But during studies of dysfunction, data revealed an unexpected insight: that even the worst circumstances can result in growth and transformation. A remarkable and counterintuitive phenomenon has been discovered, which scientists call Post Traumatic Growth.
In the US, 35 percent of the entrepreneurs studied had dyslexia. What’s remarkable – among those entrepreneurs who experience post traumatic growth, they now view their learning disability as a desirable difficulty which provided them an advantage because they became better listeners and paid greater attention to detail.
They don’t think they are who they are in spite of adversity, they know they are who they are because of adversity. They embrace their trauma and hardships as key elements of who they’ve become, and know that without those experiences, they might not have developed the muscle and grit required to become successful.
Scrappers are propelled by the belief that the only person you have full control over is yourself. When things don’t turn out well, Scrappers ask, “What can I do differently to create a better result?” Scrappers have a sense of purpose that prevents them from giving up on themselves.
People who overcome adversity don’t do it alone. Somewhere along the way, they find people who bring out the best in them and who are invested in their success. Having someone you can count on no matter what is essential to overcoming adversity.
So back to my original question. Who are you going to bet on: Silver Spoon or Scrapper? I say choose the underestimated contender, whose secret weapons are passion and purpose.
