The 2 Most Important Questions to Ask When You're Facing Challenges

By Shaun Furman

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Heroes are the people who we admire and the people that we strive to be like in our lives. We all have heroes and sometimes we get down because we look at their successes and we see that we aren’t at their level yet. But let’s take a look at the things that we admire about our heroes and the people that we look up to.

The people that we admire are also the people who have had some hardship that they’ve had to overcome. Usually they are people who went through some challenging times. We admire the people who rose to great heights from the depths of poverty, we love the underdog and we especially love those people who when the whole world was against them, they made it through.

Think about the three people that you admire most. I am guessing that these people too, went through some difficult times only to come out victorious. Most of us don’t admire Bill Gates’ children. We admire people like R. Buckminster Fuller, Mother Theresa, Mahatma Gandhi, Tony Robbins, and Oprah Winfrey. All of whom have had to overcome many adversities to get to where they are.

I have come to the conclusion that what we are really attracted to is the strength of a person’s character and not so much the material or financial success. Isn’t it also true that in your own life, you expect success without any struggle? You want it immediately. I know what it’s like because I used to be there and it still comes up from time to time. Adversity is a prerequisite to any success. If life is to be experienced in full, then you have to accept the high highs and the low lows that will occur. That’s what separates the people we admire from average people.

Ask yourself these two questions about the three people you admire most:

1. What are the qualities that I admire about these people?

2. How can I integrate each of these qualities into my life?

These two questions will help you to reframe your adversities and keep focused.