This blog is shared from Forbes.com:
I served on a grand jury earlier this year and our forewoman was in her mid-40s and always well-dressed. One day she arrived a bit late and her hair–which I suddenly realized was an expensive wig–was slightly mussed.
As one of the other women on the jury helped her fix it, our forewoman thanked her and said to the group, “I am so sorry I was late. Chemo went longer and was a bit tougher than usual.”
We started to make consoling noises–she had never told us or the judge she was sick–but she cut us off.
“Thank you, she said. “But we all have something. Let’s get to work.”
There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that that this woman will continue to have an extremely successful career once her treatment is finished.
Never Complain
Every successful person is unique. (How could it be otherwise?) But invariably one of the things they have in common is this: They don’t whine.
I noticed early on that the most successful people rarely (or never) talked about the difficulties that they had to overcome.
For the longest time, I thought it was modesty, but eventually I realized they didn’t talk about it because they didn’t think there was anything to talk about.
They had a problem or series of them. They took their problems as a given and worked hard to play the best hand they could with the cards they were dealt.
If the problem was caused by something they had done, they took great pains not to do it again. But if it was just a matter of fate, they accepted it and starting working on a way to overcome it.
Digging Deeper
There is a school of thought that says entrepreneurs–and other successful people–achieve their success because of their problems. They find a way to overcome the obstacles in such a way that leads to new opportunities, opportunities they would not have had except for the obstacles.
I think that is too pat.
Sure, it happens sometimes but I think to say the obstacle caused the success is far from always the case. I am not willing to go that far (although I know there are series of motivational speakers who tell me I am wrong.)
No matter what your position on this, we can all agree that successful people don’t let the obstacle be an obstacle for long. They face it head on and work to overcome it.
The Takeaway
Here’s where I come out on this.
A friend told me the following is Buddhist wisdom. I don’t know if he is right, but I know the thought is: “In life, pain is mandatory. Suffering is optional.”
Or, on a lighter note, as the football coach Lou Holtz once said: “Never tell people your problems. Ninety per cent of them don’t care, and the other ten per cent are glad you have them.”
Either way, don’t whine.
Just get the job done.
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Paul B. of Just Start publisheBrown is co-author d by Harvard Business Review Press.