{"id":10430,"date":"2020-08-23T19:45:31","date_gmt":"2020-08-24T00:45:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/?p=10430"},"modified":"2021-03-30T09:02:55","modified_gmt":"2021-03-30T14:02:55","slug":"the-upside-of-difficulties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/2020\/08\/23\/the-upside-of-difficulties\/","title":{"rendered":"The Upside of Difficulties"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In this year, this time, and this moment, it seems as if every one of us has something we\u2019re struggling with. This isn\u2019t to diminish pre-existing problems or concerns, but in my short life, I haven\u2019t experienced people within a culture (or portion of a culture) witness, act and suffer the way those around me in person and on social media have over the course of this year. Regardless of where you land on the political spectrum or where your allegiances lie, 2020 has presented difficulties on a major scale with major consequences for each of us and the generations to follow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead of focusing on an individual issue or topic that is currently proving arduous for Americans and others, I perceive it most appropriate\u2013based on the limited amount of time that I have your attention\u2013to examine the roles that difficulties have on us as humans. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDifficulties\u201d\nas defined by our friend Google represent, \u201ca thing(s) that is hard to\naccomplish, deal with, or understand.\u201d Not a bad definition, and it drives the\npoint home on what exactly they are, but each of us experiences very different\ntypes of difficulties. When you think of your own difficulties, what crosses\nyour mind? What makes you stumble or worry? Is it something you habitually go\nthrough or do most of your difficulties stem from random occurrences?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These difficulties drive our fears, failures and even our transgressions, unfortunately. But given the right mindset and set of intangible tools, difficulties can catapult individuals into not only finding victory, but discovering what drives their decision-making process in the first place. I guess an easier way to paint this picture would be, \u201cHow did I end up here and how can I turn this experience into something not completely negative?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the midst\nof adversity, it can be easy to address the first part of the question; not so\nmuch the second. More often than not, the difficulties we face seem to arise\nout of the necessity of being in one place at one time. We have to go to work, we have to raise our children, we have to go\nthrough life<\/em>.<\/strong> Some things are\nunavoidable, even if we see them coming in our metaphorical rearview mirror.\nSwerving or speeding up only delays the inevitable. Accepting difficulties as a\npart of life is one step, but shifting our attitudes to believe that demanding\nscenarios can create growth is another. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Kevin<\/a>
Kevin Ile and Prof. Lyna Matesi<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

What if, instead of saying, \u201cI have to go to work,\u201d we said, \u201cI get to go to work!\u201d What about replacing \u201cI have to wake up extra early tomorrow to finish a project for class,\u201d with, \u201cI have the opportunity to spend more time learning about something I care about tomorrow.\u201d Our own perception of personal difficulties is naturally jaded even though they\u2019re indeed our own. When we\u2019re faced with something we don\u2019t quite understand and are told, \u201cunderstand this,\u201d our brains struggle with making connections and finding a solution. This mentally moves us out of our comfort zone and places us in an area of difficulty. We do everything in our power to jump back to comfortability, whether it\u2019s passable or not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of my many takeaways from the UW-Stevens Point MBA program<\/a>\u2013Business 730: Managerial Leadership through Applied Leadership and Decision-Making course taught by Lyna Matesi to be more specific\u2013is that in those moments when we\u2019re tasked with a seemingly tall order, if we can break away from the notion of escaping difficulty as quickly as possible, meaningful growth can occur. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If we can reassure ourselves that there\u2019s an upside, a silver lining, the situation all of a sudden becomes a little less daunting. The search<\/em> for an appropriate, thought-out answer to a challenging issue is rewarding based on meeting a need for someone or yourself. It\u2019s also rewarding as you pull from the experience when you\u2019re faced with the next difficulty. And the next one. And the next one. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Kevin<\/figure>
\n

After earning a bachelor\u2019s degree in business administration, Kevin Ile ’19, MBA ’20 served as a graduate assistant for the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point MBA program<\/a>. Since completing the program, Kevin has advanced into a commercial lender role with Peoples State Bank in Wausau, Wisconsin. He can be contacted at\u00a0kevin.ile@bankpeoples.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In this year, this time, and this moment, it seems as if every one of us has something we\u2019re struggling with. This isn\u2019t to diminish pre-existing problems or concerns, but in my short life, I haven\u2019t experienced people within a culture (or portion of a culture) witness, act and suffer the way those around me […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":10432,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,7,12,544,552,509,545,23],"tags":[504,305,502,343,344],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10430"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/141"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10430"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10430\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10438,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10430\/revisions\/10438"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uwsp.edu\/cps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}