Struggle Outwardly

01 Nov, 2024

⏲ 3-minute read | last updated 7 months, 3 weeks ago

Success is...boring. Serial entrepreneurs are so serial about their entrepreneurship because they crave the challenge and struggle of making a startup successful. Once they get it, it's less interesting. They crave problems.

Problems are why most of us get paid. A job is essentially just solving problems (or at least, problems that can't yet be automated). The more complicated the problem(s), the more you get paid.

And problems are interesting - it's what makes a job fulfilling. Not all job are fulfilling, but then again not all problems are interesting. But certainly, having no problem to think about is definitely not interesting.

In Finding Flow, author Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi describes this phenomenon as the Paradox of Work. To grossly oversimplify: we work to create time for leisure → we expect leisure time to bring a sense of fulfillment → but when we self-report the times we feel most fulfilled, it's not leisure, it's work.

Success, as it turns out, is boring. Problems are not.

The Struggle is Good

If "struggle" is just effort exerted to confront problems, then perhaps not struggling means you're not trying hard enough. Don't push yourself, and you won't have any problems! Moreover, I'd argue refusal to brave difficult things is both (i) bad for your goals, and (ii) bad for conversation.

For Goals

My assumption is this:

1. We want to feel fulfilled, so we should...
2. Do interesting, problem filled work, which means we should...
3. Set difficult goals to create enough problems, so that we can...
4. Solve them and feel fulfilled.

That last one is important. We want to achieve success, solve problems, and meet our goals because solutions to problems are what bring fulfillment. And given the choice between going it alone or sharing your problems, struggling outwardly is the better strategy¹.

Primarily, this is because what's difficult for one person is trivial for another. Whether it's due to differing skill sets, new perspectives, or unique social and professional networks: letting other people know what you’re working on (being outward about it) taps into our differences and treats them as a features, not bugs. It's diversity-in-action.

Plus:

• One of the best gifts you can give someone is solving something that’s easy for you to solve, and hard for them (win-win).
• People like you more when you ask for help.
• Most people have an inherent desire to help.
• Talking about your goals makes them more real, and more likely for you to accomplish them (as long as you’re sharing with the right people).

For Conversations With Others

Meaningful conversations boil down to conversations about problems. Externally, that’s what opinions are - a position you have on a problem. A conversation absent a problem is just an exchange of observations (i.e - the weather today). Innocuous, but incredibly unsatisfying.

This is why improv often starts by asking the audience “does anyone have anything that’s on their mind, or that they’re struggling with”. It gives them something to chew on²!

When you're not getting anything from someone you're talking to, conversation sometimes feels like trying to climb a solid, smooth obsidian wall. No imperfections, no handholds, and no clear way to get up. To make progress, you need imperfections, they give you something to hold onto!

Conversation and connection are the same way. It’s imperfection that gives conversation texture; it's what makes it interesting.

The Struggle is Real

Imperfection is vulnerability’s mechanism of action. It normalizes experience and fosters connection because it acknowledges a fundamental truth: perfect doesn't exist. A problem-centric conversation acknowledges this, thus connecting us at the most basic human level.

Plus, it makes things way, way less boring.

#communication #word_smatter