Struggle is just part of the show

Maybe you've been in business, or life even, long enough to already know that struggle is just part of the show. I hadn't heard it said in those exact words before though. I've been training with the Nike Run Club app on my treadmill - Coach Bennett said it mid-session, and I liked it.

The way I see life in general is like a video game. We each have our own world, seen only from our own perspective. No one person's world is exactly the same as anyone else's. Similar, perhaps. Never the same. The level we're playing depends on our experiences, not our age, though age has some influence of course. Not just the experiences from one game either, from all the times we've respawned too, played the same game and lost. The people in it depend on what we need at the time. They can be allies, enemies, or just passing through briefly.

Anyway, I'll leave that there before I lose the thread, haha.

"Struggle is just part of the show" is basically the same idea. We're writing our own script for our own film, and struggle isn't something we need to cut out of it, it's part of what makes the film. If you've watched any film or any show, there's always struggle in it. If there wasn't, it would just be... boring. 🥱

Coach Bennett was talking about this in terms of running. Not every run goes to plan. Some you'll need to stop and take a break. Some you'll have to abandon altogether and come back to the next day. Some you'll just push through. But you don't give up running forever because you struggled on one run. In fact, it's the struggle that gets you your best PBs, the struggle that gets you to running 5K, 10K, a marathon.

It isn't ease that gets you there. It's the choice to choose hard now, so things get easier later.

In business, that might be three weeks of twelve hour days to get a project finished. Or it could be stepping back to deal with a family emergency, or a responsibility, when you'd rather be working.

In life, it could be saying no to everything for a day and just having a day to do the things you enjoy. As I wrote that, I realised that's something I actually need! 😅 It could be turning your phone off for an entire Saturday. It could just be spending time with the people closest to you, even when you really want to be working.

In health, it could be saying no to the cake, when you know you'll feel rubbish if you eat it. Or it could be saying yes to the cake, because you've been restricting yourself for so long you're fully miserable, and one slice resets you and gets you back to your plan.

All of this relates hugely to business, and to the big dream you have for it, because there will be times you ask what's the point. You'll see other people enjoying their lives, not a care in the world, not thinking about everything they need to do if they want to get anywhere. You'll get frustrated. You'll lose money. Your own sanity, at times. When that happens, ask why this is in your film, your book, your video game? What patterns keep repeating? What's the common denominator? What's the moral of the story? What gets you to the next level? What's the ending of this chapter?

I love explaining things in metaphors, because they're the ones that stick with me. Whenever things go wrong, I think about my video game, and if I were actually holding a PlayStation or Xbox controller, what would my next move be?

Here's a fun one for you. Next time you watch a film, look out for these:

1. The struggle

2. The villain

3. The ally

4. The lesson

5. The ending

Tell me what you watched and what you noticed, if you fancy it! Hope it helps.

Enjoy the sunshine this weekend, wherever you are! ☀️

Kaz x