For years I struggled in school, I wouldn’t have said I was dumb but I wouldn’t have told you I was super smart either. I hated school. I mean with a passion hated school. I liked the social aspect but really felt what I was learning was super watered down and unrelatable to real life. I would later discover that I struggled with ADHD. I had masked a lot of my problems with learning to be super super organized and did everything in a routine.
The only good thing I had going for me was I liked to read. At a time before YouTube self help videos took over the world and before endless blog forums on how to fix or solve this or that existed. I actually loved to read books. The one book in particular that changed my life forever was a silly calculus book written in the 1940’s (I still have it). I bought it off the used book shelf in the math department on my college campus for $1. ONE DOLLAR! The reason this book changed my life forever was because I was struggling in my college math class. It was hard. The professor was so nice but hard to understand and he had very little ability to teach math to students who weren’t good at math. Like many professors he would rush through the problems, skipping steps that students were supposed to know like the back of their hand and erase as he wrote on the board. My grade was low and I mean so low I was thinking about dropping it and changing my degree all together so I didn’t have to take any more math classes!
What this book did do was change my outlook on learning and self confidence. I got several books that day from the library, broke out my high school math books and started to teach myself step by step math. The one subject that I struggled with for years. I went all the way back to 6thgrade level math and started reviewing and relearning algebra, algebra 2, Geometry and Trigonometry. I spent weeks relearning and reteaching myself careful to use every step to solve the equation and not skip showing every detail of my work. Then I got to the Calculus book I had bought. This book had step by step directions for some of the equations that my current calculus book was missing! That was it! I know it sounds so silly to be writing about a stupid math class but what this math class did was teach me that I was the problem. It was partially my ADHD but mostly it was me. I was the problem. I had chosen to not put in the work to learn and become good at what I dreaded the most which was anything dealing with mathematics.
In that moment when I was sitting in the floor of my room with tears running down my face something had finally clicked. I finally understood what was being taught in my college class. I would love to say I changed that low low F to an A but I had spent so much time reteaching myself that I ended the semester with a mid C. But C’s are degrees! What I gained most out of that class was self confidence. I learned I was the problem but I was also the solution. I learned to believe in myself. I learned that I could not only do anything but I could also learn anything. In turn it also helped me learn to overcome my fear of testing and I ended up clepping out of more than 4 classes and graduated early from college.
As the years passed and difficult things came up in life I have had to come back to that moment when I decided I was the solution to my problems. Whether it was work, relationships, fixing stuff. If I wanted something to change, I had to be the one willing to change or make the changes to fix it.
So stop complaining about it. Do something! Sometimes all you can do is change how you react to the situation but that is still doing something. Learning you are the problem and also the solution helped give me the confidence to move. I won’t lie and say it isn’t scary. Wrong! It is sometimes scary and hard as hell! I truly believe confidence in yourself can help you succeed in anything you put your mind to. Maybe that’s for another blog.
What I would like people to get out of this blog is you have the power. If something is going wrong, you aren’t happy, maybe you can’t figure something out. Do something different. Don’t tell me you have tried everything. If you have tried everything you wouldn’t have the problem so keep going. Keep learning, researching, reaching out to people till you find the solution.
Don’t like your job, fix it. Change your mindset, go learn a new trade, quit. I don’t know what the right solution is for you but I know you have the power. I love the movie The Devil Wears Prada when Andrea Sachs wines to Nigel about how she is never going to make her boss happy or succeed at her job in the fashion magazine and Nigel looks her straight in the face and says “YOU ARE NOT EVEN TRYING”! Now mind you she was “trying” she was doing her job, what was expected or asked of her but that was it. She wasn’t going above and beyond. She realized she could be doing more, preparing more, dressing the part. Of course like all good Hollywood movies she stepped up to the plate and became the solution to her problems and not only succeeded working under the hardest boss but landed the job of her dreams. So what is it that you need to change? What is it that you are struggling with? Maybe you aren’t doing everything you can do or what needs to be done to reach where you want to be. You first need to understand that you are the problem. Yes you. You are the reason why your job sucks, why your spouse isn’t meeting your needs, why you can’t lose the weight whatever it is. BUT You are also the solution. So believe in yourself and starting now, make the positive changes that need to take place to move you to where you want to be.
Don’t look at the big picture. Set a goal and start with the little steps till you get there. If you look at the big picture you may get overwhelmed and give up. Focus on the little things. You can do it! You are the solution!