“The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me.”—Ayn Rand
Resources are scarce for a lot of people right now due to the current state of the economy; however, there’s no limit to our resourcefulness. Let Tony Robbins and Harry Houdini show you how to be more resourceful and embrace your limitations as you go after your dreams by reading the article below.
Tony Robbins: What Are You Focusing On?
During a Ted.com talk in 2006, Tony Robbins—a popular self-help writer and professional speaker who has written books such as “Unlimited Power: The New Science Of Personal Achievement”
Here are the answers:
- They say that they didn’t know enough;
- They didn’t have enough money;
- They didn’t have the time;
- They lacked the necessary technology, and so on.
That is, they argue that they didn’t have the necessary resources; and, in fact, it may be an accurate statement that they lacked these resources. However, not having the necessary resources is not the defining factor; the defining factor is resourcefulness. Robbins adds that if people are resourceful enough, if they’re creative and determined enough, they’ll find a way to achieve what they’re after.
In addition, Robbins explains that our ability to be resourceful largely depends on what we choose to focus on. Every moment of your life you’re making the following three decisions:
- What am I going to focus on?
- What does it mean? (The minute you focus on something you give it meaning. And whatever meaning you give to it produces emotion.)
- What am I going to do? (Emotion then drives you toward taking action.)
Robbins uses Lance Armstrong as an example: he was told he had testicular cancer, which then metastasized to his brain and lungs. Although the original prognosis that Armstrong received was poor, he went off and won the Tour de France a record-breaking seven consecutive years, from 1999 to 2005, a championship he had not won before being diagnosed with cancer. Robbins argues that it was fighting off this disease which gave Armstrong the mental and emotional focus he needed to win those championships.
In addition, Robbins uses himself as an example. The Thanksgiving in which Robbins was eleven years old his family had very little. Then someone came to the door and offered them food so that they could celebrate Thanksgiving dinner. Robbins’ father chose to focus on the food as charity; having to receive charity meant that he was worthless; this led him to leave his family.
Robbins, instead, chose to focus on the fact that they now had food for Thanksgiving; the meaning he gave to this was that complete strangers cared enough about him to go out of their way to make sure that he was taken care of; this led him to commit himself to reach a level of success that would allow him to help other people of low means have good meals for the Holidays. Today his foundation feeds over two million people worldwide each year during the holiday season.
So what do you choose to focus on? Are you focused on what you’re lacking, and how this lack is going to prevent you from reaching your goals? Or are you focused on what you do have, or on what you can do, and planning on ways to leverage that?
“The Houdini Solution” – Embrace Your Limitations
Composer Stephen Sondheim once said: “If you ask me to write a song about the ocean, I’m stumped. But if you tell me to write a ballad about a woman in a red dress falling off her stool at three in the morning, I’m inspired.” Although most of us are taught to think that parameters and limitations are a bad thing, having a constraint, such as a budget or time constraint, can actually make creativity blossom.
In the acknowledgements section of his book, “The Houdini Solution: Why Thinking Inside the Box is the Key to Creativity”
“Finally, everyone who ever laid obstacles in my path. Every teacher. Every college professor. Every creative director. Every client. Every one of you who said no when I would rather have heard yes. I hated you for a long time. I don’t anymore.”
I’ve written about “The Houdini Solution” before, in my post “Creative Insights From the Worldwide Web”. Ernie explains that Houdini would find himself bound and locked in chains being lowered upside down into a box filled with water, with just minutes to escape.
What would most of us be thinking in a situation like this? Instead of looking for a solution, we would be focused on the helplessness of the situation. However, Houdini would not allow himself to be consumed by a problem. Instead, he would direct all of his energy toward solving it.
Ernie explains that almost everything in our lives is a box, that is, they set limits, lines, and boundaries. This applies to our relationships, our jobs, where we live, our bank accounts, and so 0n. The question then becomes: how can we be more creative within the confines of our lives? Ernie argues that limitations are not inhibitors, but liberators.
He gives the example of “The Blair Witch Project” which is a horror film made for about $50,000.00; it ended up grossing over $240 million worldwide. The budget constraints were actually what made the movie so successful: the whole movie is told through the “recovered footage” of three young filmmakers who went into the woods to film a documentary about a local legend known as the Blair Witch, and who subsequently go missing and are never found again.
This filmmaking process–telling the story through a faux black-and-white documentary filmed by inexperienced students–is precisely what adds the element of eeriness and horror to the film which makes it so effective in freaking out audiences.
One of the actors of “The Blair Witch Project” remarked that “The constraints of this film became the essence of this film, which became the power of this film.” The makers of “The Blair Witch Project” didn’t allow the box, that is, their limitations, to defeat them. Instead, they allowed their limitations to shape and mold their vision into something it would never have become if they had had the budget to use the best equipment available and hire A-list actors.
Conclusion
Alex Shalman, who blogs over at “Practical Personal Development”, wrote recently about getting into the NYU Dental School. He failed a few times in his attempts to get in, but he didn’t allow those temporary setbacks to hold him back: he took seminars, enrolled in related courses, networked, took an internship that would help him acquire experience in his chosen field, and he continued applying to the dental school.
I love the quote that he uses in the post in which he announces his acceptance into the NYU Dental School:
“If you have a dream, whether you have to go through those doors sideways, backwards, or jump in from the roof… don’t give up.”
So the next time you find a locked door in front of you, instead of focusing on the locked door, bemoaning your fate, and simply waiting for circumstances to change or for someone to open the door, focus on what you can do and start looking for other, resourceful ways to get in.
Related Posts:
- The Hannibal Barca Approach to Achieving Your Goals
- Six Things to Do When Life Throws You a Curveball
- Freedom, Nonconformity, and Unconventional Living
- Four Ways to Achieve a Productive State of Mind
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My ebook “How to Be More Creative – A Handbook for Alchemists” explains that creativity is not the sole domain of the arts but is important in any field, from medicine to business, and from engineering to developing a creative solution to a negotiation impasse. Whatever you do, creativity helps you do it better. Discover practical advice on how to be more creative in every life endeavor by reading my ebook.
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