The Power of the Pen, Being Frustrated, and Happiness Defined
Hi Folks! Connor and Nick here from Healthy Living With Nick and Connor. Thanks again for being on our email list, it means a lot, and we are excited to share our weekly email with you. We hope you enjoy it! Here is what we hope you take away from this one:
Wield the pencil, and draft like a champion.
Lean into the frustration that comes from facing a problem or challenge. Don’t let it dishearten you, remind yourself that it comes with the opportunity to learn something new and become more resilient and creative.
If what you think doesn’t match with what you say and what you do, it can lead to expending unnecessary mental energy. If this is the case, work to change your thought process so it better matches how you’d like to portray yourself and find you will start feeling better.
Starter Mindset Tip: Reclaim the pen and get ink on paper
A good old-fashioned pencil and sheet of paper can go unrecognized as one of life’s most useful tools. Something that may seem better suited to an elementary school classroom might not seem like it would have an impact on improving your life, but don’t underestimate it. As you arrange your thoughts on new or existing goals, objectives and habits, or try to work through something bothering you, make a point to sit down and map it out before you get going. Have fun with it. Lay out the groundwork, draw out a schematic with your initial thoughts, and try to come back and keep track of things along the way to see where you’ve come. Grab a few notebooks and start drafting!
Health Recipe: Be Confused and Frustrated
Timing: Could be a while based on how long you allow yourself to be confused and frustrated!
Level of Difficulty: Hard mental workout
Serving Size: Start small, the more uncomfortable the better
Spiciness: She can be a spicy one
INGREDIENTS
Just yourself and your brain in a battle of discomfort
REASONING AND BENEFITS
When you face new problems in your life, they often bring confusion or frustration. You can respond in 2 ways: (1) Look for a way to be rescued as quickly as possible to avoid any and all discomfort. (2) Lean into the confusion and frustration and respond with curiosity and interest, and struggle to find the answer. Being confused or frustrated means that you have an opportunity to learn. You are up against something that you are unsure of, so instead of avoiding the feeling of being wrong, lost, or incompetent, you can learn in the best way possible: by being curious, trying, and maybe even being dead wrong. (Grant, p. 199) These can be called ‘desirable difficulties.’ Obstacles that make learning harder, slower, and more frustrating in the short term, but exponentially better in the long term compared to avoiding these feelings. If you take a shortcut, and have the answer given to you right away by someone else, or by the magical all knowing device in your pocket, then you are helping your short term self, but sabotaging your long term self. Struggling to come up with the answer on your own, even if it is completely wrong, will help you learn far better than having the answer given to you. (Epstein, p. 85)
INSTRUCTIONS
You are facing a problem or situation that you are unsure how to solve, and you start feeling some frustration and confusion.
Instead of avoiding these feelings and having the answers given to you, lean into the confusion and frustration and try to work on it yourself.
Be curious, be interested in solving the problem. Allow yourself to make mistakes, to be wrong, to be totally out in left field.
Maybe you will figure it out on your own, and maybe you will be dead wrong. If you are wrong, then you can learn the answer. You will learn far better if you struggle with the answer or if you are wrong.
PRO TIP: This is a great one to do with your kids. Try putting an end to excessive hint giving, and let them struggle through their learning. Mistakes create learning, discomfort helps them grow, and doing it together will help you grow together.
* The more confident you are with your wrong answer, the better the information will stick when you learn the right answer.
** Trial and error is a popular saying for a reason. Try, fail, learn. And repeat.
*** Trial by fire is another popular saying. You will find many that mean the same thing. Why do you think that is? Listen to the people before you and: Try. Fail. Learn. Repeat.
Dessert Quote:
‘True happiness is when what you think, what you say and what you do are the same thing’ – Gandhi
Now we want to hear from YOU! Please let us know what you think of today’s newsletter, and send us an example of how you applied the health recipe to your life! We would love to share how you introduced this week’s recipe into your life’s unique menu. Thanks and have a great Sunday!
Sources:
Learn more about the power of frustration:
Grant, A. (2021). Think again: The Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know. Random House.
Epstein, D. (2019). Range: How Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World. Pan Macmillan.
