Resourcefulness has a lot to do with Freedom.
When we are at a trying part of this Hero's Journey of ours, when external dependencies on resources could weigh us down, the creative capacity of the Mind can ride to the rescue. Combining Growth Mindset with experiences, daring the curious questioning of the situation – rather than issuing dooming statements or preconceived opinions – , can often bring about the attitude to turn things around; freeing ourselves from limiting presumptions that usually lurk about when doubt and uncertainty creep in.
Resourcefulness is more of a confident state of Mind, isn't it? See, how it feels like for you.
We might as well practice it, to phase out and minimise disempowering thinking. We can test out, how much and in what way this all impacts our emotional states simultaneously, which again play a major role in our Well-being.
Let us explore what other Character traits and attitudes are close relatives in this process, which help elevate our quality of Life – and through being an example of it: our Leadership.
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This trait has been a great companion in my Journey as well, hence part of the Main Lessons.
You can read the original post with major Lessons of the past few years compiled here:
Enjoy increasing your Self-awareness through today's reflection points,
we are all learning alongside each other.
Navigation – click on segment titles to read
Why favour questions over statements in our approach
Resourcefulness is an approach through question instead of declaration, for me.
Find out, if and how this works for you.
Especially at the forming of ideas stage, when we have just decided to double down on working our way up from the bottom of the metaphoric bucket of "difficult times", or are starting climbing our own Everest of sorts – the next stage of personal, career and business growth. Questions may prove to be more efficacious to expand the mental field of vision.
When we state something based on observation, we are not always aware that until a fleeting thought became a solid statement, it had gone through all the filters of our Perception. Those filters hold the current spectrum of limiting and empowering beliefs of what is possible.
A statement acts closed and finite. The underlying beliefs however, can change.
We can't always speak in questions, but we can watch the proportion of statements and questions in the way we view a situation.
Especially when in one that you perceive as difficult or complicated or stressful or all at once, forming questions to observations, can bring forth fresh perspectives.
Just like we utilise that method in Coaching and Self-coaching.
"What if...?" "Why is it...?" "How about...?"
Open-ended questions tend to be most constructive, because they allow for thought patterns to be revealed.
The order of asking them can also be relevant.
Usually the What – Why – How combination is one that helps to first understand what we know we want (intuitively often more than consciously), create a clear, strong foundation by understanding why we want it and only then start allowing the Analytical Mind to bring in its reasoning of pros and cons and alternative ways of how to get all that realised.
When we turn it around, it may slow or halt our progress, as the "How" can overwhelm us with the most tedious solution ideas, before we clarified why we put in so much time and effort into this process in the first place.
It can work, but the other way around there may be less friction, doubt and effort.
As many who succeeded in their Self-actualizing Journey already hinted: asking better questions, asking for us personally meaningful questions, can lead us onto better ways towards solutions and realising our goals.
Reflection points
Why is this information interesting to you?
What things in your Life invite you to ask questions about them?
Why now?
Why better starting now than waiting for later?
What are your inner drivers focusing on, what do you want to invest time and energy into?
What do you want to gain? What of those are tangible and intangible?
The nature of Resourcefulness
While Resilience may have a sort of "grinding teeth and we get through" feeling to it at times in our interpretations, Resourcefulness creates more of a brave yet lighthearted atmosphere. Agree? Seeing it differently? Gauge your mental-emotional perception of it yourself.
Language can aid us to accelerate insight and connect the dots in our understanding of abstract concepts.
How do you feel about the nature of Resourcefulness when I describe it as:
Closely related to Flow.
Transcending desperation and doubt.
Embodying Confidence combined with a pragmatic, exploratory lens.
Expanding to greater Creativity.
Upholding Curiosity – novel information lead to new ideas, new perspectives.
Daring positive disruption and Innovation.
Challenging the current "impossible". Learning to read it as "I'm possible".
Leading with questions.
Finding more original and authentic solutions. Pioneering.
Reframing what didn't go according to initial plan, as learning.
Prioritising helpful principles and mindsets like: "practice makes progress" and "progress over perfection" and that "there are infinite ways to Success".
Pruning unnecessary complexities and vain pessimism via mental diet.
Growth Mindset in action: turning obstacles into opportunities.
Learning to transmute stress, fears, doubts into opportunity and Faith in Self.
In "tight corner" situations, pause your habitual response.
Allow your Resourcefulness some space to spot or invent better solutions.
Useful concepts provide applicable practices for everydays
As we hone our Character, the process of learning concepts can provide reference points we can utilise.
I discovered for myself for example that the main principles of Minimalism didn't only help me with preparing for my move by decluttering physical space, but that this at times misunderstood or undervalued concept is guidance to more intentional living. I watched and read many resources from which I've learned and which speak of this same revelation.
This is a summary of how I understand its main principles today:
At first, when we are starting out expanding our comfort zone gradually, both our Resourcefulness and Resilience may feel like a suit a size too small.
Both get tested and trained in various unique ways in our Lives.
For me, in these past years, it was grief, moving countries, learning to drive on the left and right, roadtrips across Europe on my own multiple times, creating a new Home, nurturing Family and Friends connections as a solid foundation even in the midst of turbulent times, decluttering Home and Mind, expanding career to laying the foundations of my own business I believe in, building and being part of both offline and online communities of mutual interest in Personal Growth studies and this human experience.
In the past years we had a kind of collective training on them as well.
Reflection points
What has it been for you?
What can you look at as contributing factors to your now increased Resourcefulness?
Which lessons turn out to have been really worthwhile in retrospect?
What can you re-evaluate now as an opportunity and potential, even if it doesn't feel as easy just now?
At times Resourcefulness is finding solutions for temporary conditions.
Paired with Resilience, they help us weather rough periods and prepare lasting, increasingly positive Changes.
Upgrading responses to the Unexpected
Learning about the mindset of Entrepreneurship, daring yet unknown territory, outgrowing old beliefs and potentials, understanding the deeper meaning and connection of Value-creation and Abundance, and how to purposefully Self-actualize through everyday choices all mean an upgrade in our ability to respond to the Unexpected.
Complexity trains us to utilise our discernment muscles more so. Resourcefulness helps find better time-energy-attention investments with higher yield and less waste of any kind.
We work with the Present Moment, to stabilise the context of our decision-making, stripping away unnecessary doubt and confusion.
To be present, curiously, is something we need to practice as a habit in our fast-paced digital age, if we are to enjoy our Life and reach higher levels of Well-being.
Balance is key. We have habits that involve a ton of energy, action and doing. We also need to have habits that allow us to recharge and relax, so that we can generate more of that energy to create and do. A cycle. Wu Wei. Yin and Yang.
I'm going to quote here the most fundamental Flow-researcher and author, Mihály Csíkszentmihályi on that matter and let him explain in more detail, why relaxation is not only a healthy and necessary choice, but a worthwhile investment:
"Another force motivates us, and it is more primitive and more powerful than the urge to create: the force of entropy. This too is a survival mechanism built into our genes by evolution. It gives us pleasure when we are comfortable, when we relax, when we can get away with feeling good without expending energy. If we didn’t have this built-in regulator, we could easily kill ourselves by running ragged and then not having enough reserves of strength, body fat, or nervous energy to face the unexpected.
This is the reason why the urge to relax, to curl up comfortably on the sofa whenever we can get away with it, is so strong."
Resourcefulness doesn't need to stem from desperate need or applied only in crises. It may mean a limited version of this trait.
We shall nurture our physical, mental, emotional, spiritual capacity, so that we reach more excellent and accomplished forms of it.
In survival mode, we only see potential in a narrow lens directed in front of our nose. At times the danger will be real and imminent. Most of the time though it's a mental construct.
For the latter, even a single perspective shift can mean a step into a whole new way of viewing Life.
That's where you can have a look at the nature of Resourcefulness, we reviewed in a previous segment earlier, and choose which embodiment of it you prefer.
Would you prefer if you being and feeling resourceful meant an increased Creativity and enhanced Freedom, Confidence and innovative ideas?
Review once again, what are you making it mean.
Our interpretations, rooted in current beliefs, shape how we view and approach the world.
When we are to live a Life that is of high quality, prosperous, joyful, successful, rewarding and balanced, we need to take all aspects of our existence into consideration, holistically.
Living a Flow-based Life requires a high amount of Awareness, so that we can navigate our drivers on the scale of bustle and inertia to keep it at an optimal amount of liveliness while knowing when we need a pause to replenish.
We are learning to actually enjoy the Moment.
Resourcefulness and Abundance
Some time into writing I figured, at times I'm offering and affirming these ideas just as much to myself as to you.
However far we are into our conscious Personal Growth Journey, we are human with moments of doubt and "narrowedness". We can become so finetuned in our perception that we notice these moments quickly in their budding and transmute them effectively.
When many challenging things happen at once, it may take more time and energy to do that.
Being resourceful we can interpret at times of feeling-smallness that we "have to put up with" the not having of enough of this or that. We can feel exhausted with trying. We can feel temporarily defeated.
But our inner strength, our Resilience, will rocket us through those moments more often than not. Sometimes it takes sleeping on it, talking to someone, walking away from the environment while trying to shake off stressful thoughts, doing something that makes us feel more lighthearted again.
Resourcefulness may not always feel like a wise, reasonable state of Mind, sometimes it may feel like defiance. "I can do this! Whatever I have right now, I know I can do better! I have overcome much more difficult things! Let's see what I can do."
Working with who we are and what we have right now doesn't need to feel like accepting a felt contracted circumstance forever. We can work with accepting things as they are temporarily while drawing power for building more, expanding further.
Acceptance doesn't need to mean defeat or compromise.
It can mean that we pull our strength and focus together for a much better next step.
Forward movement and momentum can accelerate from there.
I recall how many Meditations I had and lectures I listened to that spoke of finding Abundance in the freely available things around us: in Nature, in the tiniest of things that seem as expansive, in offering the value of peace of Mind, as the Universe.
Sunshine, leaves on the trees, being able to think, talk and all functionalities that seem granted, clouds floating, the taste of coffee, having people we can listen to (virtual or Family and Friends) or share with, being there for ourselves.
This is where mental-emotional states can expand on each other. As you upgrade your thought processes, you feel the expansion of positive moods along with it.
Reviewing and acknowledging what is good in our current environment, but may have blended into our daily perception, shall become a regular exercise.
Investing time to revel in it. Appreciate it.
Emmet Fox called that dwelling in his 7 Day Mental Diet.
Reflection points
What are you choosing to dwell in?
What fuel are you choosing for mental-emotional states?
What elements do you give any of your Life Force to? Are they giving back?
Which activities, events, people perpetuate a balanced loop of positive, recharging energy?
You can become aware of your ability of feeling empowered and increase that feeling and affirm: "I am abundant and resourceful".
I let Stephen Covey conclude this post, so that you may feel the Compassion and encouragement from both of us, as we all learn alongside each other in this human experience:
Recommended resources
I like to regularly recommend the following books. They cover most recurring elements related to Personal Growth, Flow and the impact of Awareness and Mindset on our Lives.
Stanford psychologist Dr. Carol S. Dweck's work is especially valued in the realm of Mindset work. Her book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success is an essential read and regularly referenced in this topic. Even if you just read a few pages (case studies) of this book, your perspective on what is possible may shift for good.
Stephen R. Covey The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change contains the concept of the Circle of Influence and other fundamental ideas that remain key pillars of Self-development.
Mihály Csíkszentmihályi Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience is all about how your level of Flow can optimally change your Life – what it is, how to access, maintain and increase it. The entire process is permeating my Coaching work and guidance to increase our Quality of Life.
Dr. Joe Dispenza Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself: How to Lose Your Mind and Create a New One is a book about Consciousness, Mind-Body connection and is a scientifically backed up explanation that can convince even otherwise unpacifiable sceptics that we have the ability to change for the better – if we really want and decide to. This is a book for our bookshelf to be read and re-read, as we more and more integrate the knowledge we gain from it and start to deeply understand ourselves and human dynamics through it.
H. García and F. Miralles Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life
Eckart Tolle The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
Shad Helmstetter's What To Say When You Talk To Yourself can be a revelation if you are grappling with destructive Self-talk.
How to Be Your Own Best Friend via Self-Talk (What to say...). In this video Joseph Rodrigues combines these two powerful ideas so we can see how their application benefits us.
I bring all my learnings into my shares, reflection exercises, Coaching, so that my personal investments and revelations enrich not only my Life, but through my Work all your Lives too.
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