I wanted to talk today about this idea of the relationship between tenacity and denial.
Tenacity has served me really well throughout my life for a variety of things.
However, there were times in my life when it actually caused me some pain.
That pain was caused when my tenacity turned into denial.
In my youth, I was in a bad car accident, broke my tibia (calf bone) and it was set incorrectly.
This had me spend the majority of my adult life with a lower leg at a 10 degree angle.
So I adjusted…I couldn't run anymore, so I started biking.
I couldn’t do very technical hikes, so I got into mountain biking.
This was fine…did not think about it much. I did not think most people noticed.
I did freak out a bit when “skinny leg pants” came out, but other than that, I was fine.
About a decade ago I started having some pain in my knee and found out that this angle in my calf was wearing out my knee joint.
I was not ready to put an appliance in my body (that solution was too big for where I was at)
…so the tenacious part of me looked for workarounds.
A variety of Physical Therapy and workouts. Various shots into my knee.
Using shopping cards as walkers when I went shopping.
All of these served me well in continuing to have a quality of life I wanted managing this problem.
I remember one day realizing that I had a trip planned to Yosemite with my family in about six weeks and I was on the couch asking myself:
“How bad did I really need to go to the bathroom?
Was it worth making the 15 foot trek and experiencing that pain?”
I crossed the line from tenacity helping me to denial of how bad this issue really was.
I did have life changing corrective surgery and I still have my knee! (story for another day).
I often find this pattern when working with business owners. Their tenacity in problem solving and workarounds can cause them to be in denial about when those workarounds are no longer working.
Think about some critical issues facing your business right now.
What feelings come up when you think about them?
🔅 Resistance
🔅 Tension
🔅 Stress
🔅 Fear
🔅 Anger
You may be in denial about how big they really are.
There are some simple ways to mitigate falling too far into this trap.
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