A friend of mine and football coach James Jones has a unique perspective on handling adversity. When challenging his players to face adversity head on, he demands that they learn to get comfortable “Living in the Wheeze!” He said, “The Wheeze” is that place where you feel like you can’t breathe, you think your body can’t do anymore, and the cowardly thought of quitting starts to creep into the back of your mind.
Author Napoleon Hill said “Every adversity carries with it the seed for an equivalent advantage”. The simple truth is that the adversity you face physically, mentally and spiritually will refine your life and increase your growth and vision or it will define your life and create deficits you can’t easily recover from.
No clear minded thinker is going to disagree that withdrawing from adversity is the wisest tendency. As individuals, we should clearly distinguish and define the adversity we are facing and then create a clear strategy for dealing with it.
If you haven’t done the work to define yourself and you don’t know how to live from a clear understanding of your personal identity and your core values, then you will face the adversity in your life at the mercy of your emotions, hoping to feel up to it, and trying to stay motivated.
Facing adversity starts with capturing your thoughts and getting you’re emotions under control, so your going to need to develop some mindset tools so you can stay properly motivated. More importantly, growing and creating an advantage from adversity means that the choices and decisions you make must come from a strong understanding of your personal identity and be filtered by your strongest beliefs and values.
I’M CHALLENGING YOU! In 60 seconds or less can you clearly articulate your purpose, 10 core values and recite a personal mission statement to hold yourself accountable through the adversity you face?
Do the work at mayhemmindset.com to get prepared for adversity and get comfortable “Living in the Wheeze!”
With Strength and Honor
Jim Hensel
