Create your own recipe for the hard things!
In everyone’s life, there will be a situation where you will be faced with multiple problems, and you don’t have answers to them. So, even though you bring all your self-motivation and try to drive yourself to solve it, you will not know the direction or formula to arrive at a solution. Sometimes, Imposter Syndrome hits — Am I ignorant? might be others are well-educated on the problem-solving skills, and I’m not?
I’ve faced it, and somehow I’ve overcame those problems without a formula. But, I’ve also failed many times. And I never talked about this to get any help. It was more like a “Do, fail and learn” approach.
But, at one stage, I thought I had to validate this approach. Once in my career, I faced many challenges at once — it was hard. I gave a call to my boss, Soma, to seek out help. He has a unique way of mentoring, approaching the problem from a different perspective. After sharing his experiences, he suggested a book called “The Hard Thing About Hard Things” by Ben Horowitz. I started the book, and within a few seconds, I got to read this,
“There’s no recipe for really complicated, dynamic situations. There’s no recipe for building a high-tech company; there’s no recipe for leading a group of people out of trouble; there’s no recipe for making a series of hit songs; there’s no recipe for playing NFL quarterback; there’s no recipe for running for president; and there’s no recipe for motivating teams when your business has turned to crap. That’s the hard thing about hard things — there is no formula for dealing with them.”
Well, that wasn’t really helpful at that time. I was like, “dude, this isn’t that I want” But, that’s the hard truth. The whole book is about the author’s failures and wins. And, looking back at my life, it is true. All the hard things that I overcame it’s mostly the ‘try and learn’ approach. I think, looking back at your life, you can relate to this as well. We got to create our own recipes when we face unique challenges.
This is the must read book for leaders and product managers, you can buy it from the below link.
https://amzn.to/3JAMYnW
