Do Hard Things

It's the surest path to self confidence

Do the very things people expect you to fail at.

— Abiola Okun

You know how we have a lot of things on our plate and we start nitpicking at the things that are very easy, while we continue to push the hard and more difficult things forward simply because we think they are too hard and they need some type of a miracle? Well, that is the fastest way to beat your confidence down as a person.

How would you rate your confidence if you were given a 10point scale? Whatever your answer is, here's one thing you need to know. The surest way to build self confidence, self respect, and even your self esteem is to continuously do hard things.

You see those things that seem insurmountable and almost impossible, yeah? When you start doing them, especially when you say you would do them, it helps you grow confidence in yourself to do more hard things and expand your capacity in life.

Brian Tracy calls them the biggest frogs, and he implores us to eat our biggest frogs first. And trust me, your life will look completely different if you start doing hard things.

The reason why many people get stuck in one position for many years is because they dread doing hard things. And that's actually not their fault. It is the natural human brain proclivity to shy away from anything that stretches it too much.

We naturally don't want to stress our brains, that's why we keep it moving when we have to think much especially where we don't even need to, in our comfort zones, or where isn't important.

This is why we generally choose instant gratification, until we train ourselves to be better.

The difference between a person who amasses a lot of growth that ends up making him a success and someone who simply lives by the standards of a mediocre is the simple fact that they trained their minds to do hard things. To take risks with themselves.

Train your mind to do hard things.

People who don't train their minds for hard things will naturally almost never finish projects simply because it got hard. Once they cross the first stage of learning euphoria and things start getting hard, they simply abandon it in pursuit of easier things.

However, people who have worked at hard things will only continue even when it gets harder. They will ensure they finish regardless of how hard it gets.

Training your mind for hard things is essential, because it is only a mind fortified for hard work that is able to chase opportunities, learn new and hard skills that helps them grow high earning capacities.

A mind trained for hard things can easily risks because they know that regardless of what comes out of that risk, they have been built to handle whatever consequences, and even if they weren't afore built, it's an opportunity to build themselves further.

The harder the things you do, the more confidence you build in yourself. The more it helps you trust yourself and your capacity. The more you're able to teach other people, and the greater the quality of your life.

Nobody is saying you'll be perfect. You will fail and hit your butt on the ground a few times (okay, I lied, maybe a couple of times...okay, I lied again, a lot of timessssss). In fact, doing hard things guarantees you for failure, but the beauty of it is that, it goes ahead to then fortify you against failure. You won't care much for failure again as you start to define it in terms of progress.

Try to picture failing at the easiest of tasks and failing at the hardest of tasks. Imagine how different you will feel in those different situations. It is not a big deal when you fail at hard things. It was hard anyway! You're going to try again, and you'd certainly have learned a few things. But when you fail at something you're already good at? When you fail at ABC? Now that's a different level of failure.

So here's the advice. Stop doing small things. Do the very things people expect you to fail at. Do the very things even you expect you to fail at. And then fail and fail and fail and fail again until you succeed.

In those times, trust me, you'd have gained confidence in yourself because that's one of the surest ways to gain confidence, doing hard things and moving towards success in them.

Trying hard things move you from wondering what your capacity is, wondering if you can do things, and takes you to looking forward to how far you'd go to learning and developing.

You want to build self confidence? Start with the tough work. Start doing the hard things.

You want to explore your creativity? Do the hard things. The things people already expect you to fail at. It'll give you limitless trials, and an expansive space to try out creative things, as you will never define yourself against failure that comes from it, but you will build your confidence in the event of success.

Confidence because you have tried that which is hard, that which you expected to fail at, and then you succeeded, no matter how many times you failed.

Even as the week continues, deliberately make it your mission to do the hard things, no matter what those hard things are. Whether it is speaking up, standing up for other people, learning a new skill, putting yourself out there, facing the crowd, reading a book, saying no, embarking on a project, building a relationship, ending one, whatever it is, just do it.

Do Hard Things.

To your growth,

Abiola Okunsanya,

Handzinspired. ✨