Do you like puzzle games? I’m talking about an adventure game that takes you from one puzzle to the next, through a story line built into a world of graphics and music and characters. Like a lot of games, they capture a fundamental truth about life.
In these games, I’ll go for a while, doing the easy puzzles and enjoying the graphics, speculating on the story line, and then there comes a point where I can’t figure it out. At that point, usually, I’ll walk away from it. And then in a while, another approach will occur to me. Maybe it works; maybe it doesn’t. If I can’t figure it out, I can always look it up (it is just a game).
But the same thing happens, no matter what difficult task I’ve taken on for myself. I start off, tra-la-la. This is easy and then splat. There’s a puzzle I can’t figure out. It’s very tempting to say, “Whoa. This is harder than I thought. Maybe I should quit.” But I walk away from it and try another thing, look for resources, and before I know it, I’ve solved that problem and moved on to the next level.
The truth is, everything worth doing is hard, and every problem solved is another tool in the toolbox, another skill mastered, another level forward in the game. Discouragement speaks when I’m afraid that I won’t be able to learn the next step.
But treating it a little more like a game and a little less like my life/career/self-image/whatever is one the line makes it easier to move forward.
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