how to achieve success for stubborn people
achieve success and stubbornness are not always going hand in hand
stubbornness is a characteristic that gets in the way of progress. when someone says "i'll never do that," that person is usually telling themselves that they have a problem. it's not that they don't want to accomplish something, but rather than doing it, they just won't get around to it. so, instead of pursuing that goal, they will just try to forget about it, because it's "not worth it" or they just don't have the willpower to follow through.
strictly speaking, stubbornness can be seen as a personality quality. a person with traits of stubbornness will do whatever it takes to the very end - even if it means failing, falling, injuring, or even hurting others.
stubbornness also helps you sometimes beat the gravitational pull of society and allows you to simply open new opportunities into your life. one aspect of stubbornness means having willpower, which is one of the more difficult traits to possess and certainly one of those that requires focus. it all boils down to one fact: if you want to succeed at anything, you need to force yourself to do your best - and to do it in one direction.
if you want to know what causes stubbornness, it's all about vision. if you're not working toward any sort of personal or professional "vision" for yourself, you're going to have problems being stubborn. when someone wants something badly enough, but doesn't have any kind of vision for themselves, they tend to fail early.
of course, this doesn't mean that there are no individuals out there that have a vision but simply that the majority of them don't know how to translate that vision to a reality.
the key to beating stubbornness is understanding that there is only one true way to get anywhere in life and that is to get right up in their own face it. by forcing yourself to take one simple step in the right direction (and not the wrong one), you will find that you're actually moving in the right direction.
by all means, when you're faced with a seemingly insurmountable obstacle, the tendency is to just back away from it and refuse to do anything about it. this is the surest way to fail at anything because you will be doing everything you can to avoid it. however, this is the very opposite of what you should be doing.
as someone who has seen success in spite of stubbornness, i will tell you that the answer is simple: find a great way to motivate yourself into taking the action required to achieve your goals. for example, if you feel like you won't be able to get into a new job that you have longed for because you are afraid of applying in an unappealing place, try applying in places that you feel look great to you.
you will find that once you get used to seeing yourself in the same environment as your dream job, you will feel like you can conquer anything. and this principle applies to stubbornness as well - once you learn how to put yourself in the right position rather than the uncomfortable one, you will be forced to take the proper actions.
article by: mirko francioni
