We all face obstacles in our life, many that seem to pop up out of nowhere. This past year has certainly been a year filled with obstacles for many of us – as we’ve had to navigate school, work, relationships and financial issues during the pandemic.
Joining me in this week’s interview which can be viewed here is Rose Wetzel. The messy fun of growing up in a family of nine kids prepared Rose Wetzel for life as a professional obstacle course racer and American Ninja Warrior athlete. And how her lessons from obstacle racing can help prepare you for real-life obstacles.
Rose’s 3 tools for navigating life’s obstacles:
1. “So many great tools out there.I think one would be keeping perspective and have developing the ideas of cognitive reframing and adversarial growth and thinking – when something not great is happening right now – but we all know that that’s a part of life. We all know that stuff happens. So to kind of, understand that it doesn’t necessarily mean I’m doing something wrong or I am a failure – it just means I gotta figure this out. And keep perspective and say – you know what, right now, this feels really big and in my face, but there’s a good chance I’m going to be able to work through this. – And maybe you can get some help, but find a way through this and be able to look back and say, oh yeah, that was tough, but here I am now, it’s, you know, it’s over and done. So that perspective, that adversarial growth, that idea of – I’m going to learn from this and it’s going to actually make me stronger. So that, that kind of idea, that perspective, I think is great.
2. it’s also great to avoid these two traps – whether you have an obstacle in front of you, or are just trying to maximize your enjoyment of life. And the two traps are the comparison trap and avoiding the “I’ll be happy when” trap. So we all do this, the comparison trap. It is so easy to fall into the comparison trap, especially on social media. It’s like, well, that person’s life looks great and that person’s life looks better than mine. And someone could look at me right now and say, oh my gosh, she’s like road tripping from Colorado to the Pacific Northwest where she’s going to see your friends and family and she’s training and she’s going to race in Utah and all this great stuff. And that is my life. And it is, it’s so great. I’m a professional athlete. I get paid to work out who gets paid to work out?! But at the same time, what you don’t always see is the fact that I got broke my car broken into yesterday at the Trailhead. I had nothing valuable showing but still. So that was frustrating. And then I had a little injury coming on, which luckily I’m fine now since going tot the chiropractor, but you just never know what else someone is dealing with. So that whole comparison trap, everyone has their own unique tools, unique setbacks and obstacles they’re dealing with. So instead of saying, oh, their life is so much better. Just say, Hey, my life is good in these ways. And it’s tough in these ways. And how can I just work through those things and really savor and enjoy the great parts and really work through the tough parts and back to that whole idea of these tough things make me stronger. Um, and make me more relatable as a human, if someone else is going through a tough time, things like that. So adversarial growth, avoiding the, comparison track,
3. and also avoiding the I’ll be happy when trap – it’s just so easy to say to ourselves, oh, I’ll be happy when I graduate. I’ll be happy when I get that great job, when I meet that right person, when I retire, when I, when I, when I, when I have a child and my child grows up and ….We kind of forget to actually stop and be happy. There’s always kind of something else to be shooting for. And we don’t always get that moment where we’re like, you know, retired and financial secure, but then also like healthy and fit enough to actually go travel and enjoy life. So I say, I’m going to be happy now. And yeah, I’m still gonna work on this over here or I’m really looking forward to that over there, but I’m going to be happy now as much as I can, using mindfulness or using whatever tool- awareness, meditation is a great tool. I have not mastered meditation, but I do think it works even when I just get like one minute of like calm in my mind.”
To learn more about Rose, please visit her at:
Website rosewetzel.com
LinkedIn Rose Wetzel
Facebook Rose Wetzel
Instagram @runningrosie
Twitter @rosewetzel
