How To Change Obstacles Into Opportunities

Young annoyed female freelancer using laptop at home
Photo by Andrea Piacquadio

You can change your problems into opportunities. The best way is to change your mindset. It is to change how you look at problems. You cannot live a problem-free life. Not possible. If you want to learn from your problems, take them as learning opportunities. Don’t take your problems as problems. If you look at them well enough, you will see what you have been looking for- peace.

“If you don’t take action to change your problem, your problem will change you.”

When you hit a road block on your way to success, take it as a challenge, not a setback. Find a way to make it work to your advantage. Find a way to make things better. Don’t run away from your problems. If you do, they will get bigger. You have power over your problems. Norman Vincent Peale said, “When obstacles or difficulties arise, the positive thinker takes them as creative opportunities. He welcomes the challenge of a tough problem and looks for ways to turn it to advantage.” That is what you should do when you run into one.

Running away from your problems is not solving them. But taking actions to make them work for you, not against you, is all you need to do. Don’t kid yourself! It is okay to think positively. But to be really honest, if you don’t take a positive action, your problem won’t go away. If you don’t take action to change your problem, your problem will change you.

How To Know Yourself Better?

Woman in Red T-shirt Looking at Her Laptop
Andrea Piacquadio

You have got to be patient with yourself. It takes time to really discover your true self. You cannot know yourself better if you are not honest with yourself. Be honest with yourself. Do not hide behind anything. Do not wear any mask to cover your face. Reveal who you really are to yourself. Don’t do what other people are doing. Do what your heart is telling you to do. You must allow yourself to be yourself. You are still searching for your real self because you haven’t allow your true self to come out.

To know yourself better, you must allow yourself to be vulnerable. You must allow yourself to look foolish. Do your own thing. Follow your own passion. But before you follow your passion, you must find a way to test your passion. Because your passion has to be yours. If not, you are just wasting your time. Norman Vincent Peale said, “Our problem is to become acquainted with our own selves, letting our personalities loose upon the world for the sheer adventure of their full development and in the positive hope that they may in their own way lift the level of humanity.” If you don’t know who you really are, you can’t develop yourself. And if you cannot develop yourself, you cannot develop others.

“To find yourself, think for yourself.”- Socrates

You must do your own thing. It is easier to deceive yourself than to face your own reality. If you can’t face your own reality, if you can’t do your own thing, if you can’t follow your own dream (even if it is unpopular), you are just chasing other people’s dreams. You are just living other people’s lives. It is okay to learn from other people. But live your own life. Be comfortable with your failures. Be comfortable with your mistakes. Be ready to be vulnerable. There can be no progress without vulnerability. If you are not ready to try new things, you are not ready to leave your comfort zone. Whether you are ready to leave your comfort zone or not, know this: “Your true self is not in your comfort zone.” To know yourself better, you must embrace yourself. You must be comfortable looking at yourself in the mirror. And to know yourself, you must look within you. Are you ready?