Don’t Give Up! Overcoming Obstacles and Making Your Dreams a Reality

Waking up and being excited about the day is one of the best feelings that one can have, especially when it happens on a regular basis. This indicates that whatever we are doing, it is in alignment with who we really are. It means that we are on the right path towards achieving our goals.

Unfortunately though, seeing highly motivated people is a rare occurrence. The majority of us like to play it safe. This means having stability in life and staying within the comfort zone. This also means doing what everyone else is doing and what we have been taught to do by the older generations. “Get a good education. This will earn you a prestigious job and all of the other benefits that you need. Also, buy a house and a car.” We all have heard these or similar words before.

There isn’t anything wrong with it, and most of us are ok with living a “standardized” lifestyle. Like I said, living a life differently means getting outside of our comfort zone, which means stress. And we don’t like to experience stress. In fact, the fear of stress and of the unknown is what holds the majority of people back, preventing them from experiencing genuine fulfillment in life.

But what if you are “crazy” enough and you don’t want to live a secure life like everyone else? What if you want to do it differently? Maybe you want to become a spiritual practitioner and detach yourself from the society. Or maybe, as it is the more common scenario, you simply want to be self-employed. You dream of creating something of your own.

Don’t Give Up

Adversity

Regardless of what unique path you decide to pursue, you will be required to meet uncertainty, adversity and even failure. And whether you overcome these things or not, will be determined by your inner strength.

Unfortunately, having a life vision is not enough to be successful. Anyone that has decided to leave their zone of comfort, may very well soon find themselves in a burnout state. Why? Because they failed to anticipate what was ahead of them.

Nobody said it would be easy. But the bottom line is that hard work beats talent. This means working hard towards achieving your goals, but also working hard on yourself.

You need to learn to stay strong and persistent when difficult times come around. Be calm towards failure and see it for what it really is. Failure is not the end of life. Instead, learn what you can from it, become stronger, and don’t give up. Keep moving forward but with new, more advanced, strategies.

When I work with people, I always remind them that life is lived not from the outside in, but from the inside out. We must not exist in the reactive state, but rather in the responsive state. What this means in practice is that, ideally, nothing happening on the outside of us should affect our inside world. We don’t have the power over external events, but we do have the power to choose the ways in which we respond to these events. In the end, it’s our mind that dictates how we experience life, not the things that are happening around us.

When it becomes clear to you that you have the full potential to control how you experience the good and bad events in life, that is when you learn to see that failure is nothing more than a temporary setback. With this state of mind, adversity is just a part of the game for you, and you don’t give up.

Recommended read: My Top 10 Strong Work Ethic Rules for a Solo Entrepreneur

Confidence

You can learn to be confident as you go along your path, but the best way to maximise your chances of success is by starting off with a strong preliminary research.

Before you quit your job completely in order to become fully self-employed, make sure you understand what is ahead of you. Some of the things to ask yourself:

• Is this worth it?
• Why am I doing this?
• Can I become successful with this business model?
• How long would it take me to reach my goals?
• What are my other options?
• What happens if something goes wrong?
• What can go wrong?

If you ask yourself these questions before you fully commit, you won’t have to ask yourself these questions when you are caught off guard later on. And if you do feel like you are having a tough time with succeeding, you won’t be affected by it as much because you are fully aware of why you are doing what you are doing. You have your vision and your research to back you up and motivate you when things become uneasy.

If it would be easy, everyone would do it

One thing to always keep in mind that any non-typical path taken, is going to have its challenges. If it would be easy, everyone would do it. Everyone who wishes it, would be a successful millionaire or a movie star. But as it was already mentioned, people choose security over freedom most of the time.

But possible difficulties should not scare you away. The more you give, the more you will get. The more you work on yourself, the better you get and the more exciting your life becomes. Instead of focusing on all of the challenges, think of how much fulfillment you will have in your life doing what you actually deeply care about. Not many people will tell you that they love what they do, but you can become one of these people. The only individual that may be holding you back from reaching your dreams is you yourself.

Happiness does not come from external material possessions, but rather from the fulfillment that you will get when you accomplish things. Focus on that, keep moving forward, don’t give up.

Nothing is eternal

When people make errors and experience adversity, they may believe that it will be like that forever. But this is a common misbelief caused by stress, and it affects our further progress.

You must always remember that just as success can’t happen to you 100% of the time, so can’t failure. If you are having a difficult day or week, don’t give up right then. Give it some time, let it pass. The goal is to stay aware and to control yourself and your emotions when you are feeling tired and worn out.

Awareness in life is also something that I cannot stress enough. Have you ever seen how some people always complain about everything? You know how they say that it’s something’s or someone’s (other people, economy, weather, educational system) fault that they are not getting what they deserve? Usually, these people are completely unaware of themselves and the events that happen to them. If they would be more aware, they would understand that it’s them who are in charge of their lives, not others.

People with awareness don’t allow “bad days” get to them. They are in full control of their emotions and, as a result, of their life.

Recommended read: 6 Real Reasons to Keep a Daily Journal – Living in Awareness

Don’t quit, don’t give up

As the Chinese proverb goes:

“The temptation to quit will be greatest just before you are about to succeed”.

Have you ever wondered how many people quit right before they succeeded? People give up and quit all the time, and the chances are that some of them could have made it big, had they been more persistent.

We all face difficulties in life, but don’t give up just because you think it’s over. When you do feel this way, tell yourself “I am not there yet, but I will give myself another chance”. Go back to your initial research, look at your life vision, remind yourself why you are doing all of this, stay strong and keep pushing forward.

People will tell you that you can’t

People will tell you that you can’t, but don’t listen to them. You are in charge of your life, and just because someone else is weaker than you and doesn’t want you to succeed, doesn’t mean that it is the truth.

People don’t generally like changes, and they don’t like it when you change and achieve more than them. People hate knowing the fact that some get to live their life the way they want to.

Your freedom will inevitably make other people jealous. But that’s ok, because you know your own goals and where you are heading. Just keep moving forward. Remember, life is lived from the inside outwards, and nothing or no one should be able to influence your inner world.

I understand that this kind of inner strength is not easy to attain, but it is a quality you should strive to master.

Enjoy the ride

Let’s face it, life is not easy. But whether you enjoy or hate it depends only on how you look at things. Some people live in poor conditions and have to constantly look for ways to survive, yet they are able to genuinely experience happiness. On the other hand, there are people that have everything they need in life, but they still seem to be so sad. They are lacking a sense of fulfillment in life.

Regardless of what you are going through, try to see the positive sides in everything. Spend 5 minutes when you wake up and 5 minutes before sleep on contemplating all of the positive things that have happened to you throughout the day. If you think about it, you will see that there is always something to be thankful and grateful for. We so easily forget about these things.

Try to enjoy the ride even in the most difficult times, keep smiling and don’t give up.

In conclusion, know that every successful person out there had their struggle. You cannot achieve great results without first making mistakes. They are inevitable and are a part of the process of finding fulfillment. But the main thing to always remember is that all obstacles can be overcome.

Thank you for stopping by and good luck!

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