Each individual has a life full of challenges. Intelligent individuals interact with their problems by engaging their mental processes in finding solutions for problems. It encourages them to move towards success. To achieve success in life, you should confront the daily challenges you face on a regular basis.

A person’s intelligence is reflected in how he interacts with everyday life’s challenges and learns from his mistakes. Life seems like a mystery, as it is full of unsolved puzzles. But the obstacles in our daily life are not gruelling to solve, it is our habit of being judgemental that makes them remain insurmountable

and unfair. To overcome these problems, one should stop judging one’s abilities. Judgments, especially of our own abilities, can lead to harmful and negative consequences. It harms our self-esteem and happiness. In addition, it negatively influences our thoughts, emotions and physical health. By avoiding to face life’s everyday challenges, a person is not able to gain the ability to solve and overcome problems, and so may not be able to lead a happy and content life.

Rather than judging one’s own abilities and becoming unsure, a person should analyse and take on challenges that are important to face, if they want to move forward in life. These challenges provide opportunities to do better, to grow as a person and attempt something new. Without opportunities, we can’t succeed.

Generally it is said that life without challenges is not worth living or a life without challenges is worthless. This statement explains the significance of obstacles in life. Life without these would be meaningless. Let me explain it. Would it not look strange if we get everything without struggling for it? Yes, life would be very easy, but would it not be boring too? Life would just be too easy without giving us the chance to evolve and grow.

For better understanding, consider how we grew up from a child to become an adult. Covering this distance involved a lot of different challenges that we had to overcome and that also made our life adventurous. Challenges and obstacles make us gather all our strengths, skills and hidden talents, and use these to navigate the difficulties we face.

And after overcoming a challenge, we become more confident, more aware of what we are capable of and better equipped to handle what comes our way in the future. Without challenges, life will not be memorable as we wouldn’t value it.

Helen Keller wisely said, “Life is either a great adventure, or nothing at all”.

Everyone is a victim of their circumstances. These circumstances are like stepping stones. We can’t change them completely, but we do have the choice to face them with hope and confidence. Everyone is gifted with unique aspirations, but due to the limitations set by our circumstances, we develop the ability to start splashing cold water on our hopes, and this leads to negative thinking.

Negativity leads to hopelessness. It doesn’t let us even try doing what we are easily capable of. Negative people are surrounded with a feeling of deep distress caused by disappointment or mishap, whereas positive people would avoid these typical negative thoughts as they lack negativity and self-doubt. After even failing, positive people have positive vibes that support them to learn from their mistakes and faults, and they still possess the confidence to start again.

On the other hand, negative vibes in us never let us confront any challenge due to fear and frustration that built up in our mind. This also fills us with discouragement and a gloomy outlook. This basically means that we are defeated by our own frustration. If we fail once in life, it doesn’t mean we can never succeed.

Failing in life is an art that teaches us how to identify and correct our mistakes. Failure leads to success because intelligent individuals learn through their mistakes. Even after feeling sad because of our defeat, if we overcome this pain and again face the challenges in front of us, there is a greater chance that we will do better this time. This is because we now know the mistake we made that made us fail the last time.

Generally, few individuals behave like this after failing, as everyone finds it easier to let negativity take over and indulge in self-pity. A negative mind draws us back, it discourages us from facing life’s everyday problems. Frustration makes us hide our flaws by directing the anger of failing towards our circumstance, fate and others. Without taking ownership of our failures, we will not move forward and enjoy the sweet taste of our success.

We all desire to live our life according to our dreams. By concealing our flaws and insecurities, we try to appear more confident, but it can never be enough to lead to true success. Indeed, if we observe our own flaws, we can learn from them and overcome them. We can then easily eliminate our imperfections from our personality.

We can hide our flaws and imperfections from others, but not from ourselves. But many times we may be too much of a coward to even acknowledge things to ourselves. We may ignore the root of the problems by taking shortcuts or by trying tactics that lead to temporary success.

But even after this, we are the same insecure and imperfect person, just now we have some bunch of tricks up our sleeves. Temporary success makes us feel confident for a short time and after that we face extreme disappointment.

We are humans and humans make mistakes. It is only the smart and intelligent ones who learn from those mistakes. Success is the name of learning from our errors and then trying once more. Victory only comes to those who try. Negativity makes us doubt and question our abilities rather than our problems, whereas positivity determines the direction of life, irrespective of the fact whether we win or lose.

So what are you going to do — face your problems and learn how to overcome them or give up and stop moving forward in life?

Published in Dawn, Young World, November 13th, 2021