When Dr. Jordan Peterson was asked how he stopped students from protesting his lectures, he said, “I held them in the morning.”
Apparently, the mini messiahs who feel compelled to save all the “weak-minded” individuals who might hear what he has to say and, gasp, might actually agree with him, can only do that if it doesn’t require them to get out of bed before noon. Shocking.
This is where so many protesters get it wrong. I absolutely support their right to protest—but standing in a picket line with a sign doesn’t do diddly-squat for saving the turtles or changing the “system” you don’t like. It might feel like you’re doing something, but all you’re accomplishing is annoying everyone else around you.
If you truly stand for a cause and want to make real change happen, go DO something useful for the cause. Host your own lecture, start and organize a fundraiser, volunteer your time, donate money, or take some useful action. Don’t just stand there screaming like a Karen and interfere with others practicing their right to assemble, free speech, or operate a business.
Positive, massive action is the right way to deal with the things in life you want to change.
When bad stuff happens or situations arise that are less than ideal, we must become the person who can, as Timex famously coined, “take a lickin’ and keep on tickin’,” by facing the problem head-on and DOING something about it.
The reality is that most folks can’t, or, more accurately, won’t. They’re easily broken, dissuaded, and deterred. Easily put off their chosen path, easily frightened into inaction. Easily lulled into an acceptance of their situations. Easily limited.
This IS what separates successful entrepreneurs from the rest of the world. While everyone else sucks their thumbs and settles in for a “long winter’s nap” when things go wrong, tough-minded entrepreneurs go to work and take on the burden and responsibility to BE the change—not wait for the change to happen, the clouds to part, or the sun to shine.
Like the Monty Python knight, we stand our ground and fight on with missing arms and legs, screaming, “It’s only a flesh wound!”
We do NOT have to be grateful for every bad thing that comes along—but if we want to be truly successful in life (and especially in business), we must take all bad things that happen head-on and embrace the full responsibility of making the damned lemonade. We do NOT have to whistle while we work, but work we must—striving, pushing, pulling, and pounding through the obstacles. Going toe-to-toe with whatever bully, ogre, or demon we have standing in our path to make the most of what we’ve been handed.This IS the price of the kind of success you want. Don’t forget it.
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