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David J.
Pollay
Read David's bio and previous columns
From the time I entered kindergarten until my sophomore year in college,
I played football. It was my passion. And to get bigger and stronger, I
began to lift weights the summer before my freshman year in high school.
Over the next six years, I worked out regularly. And I worked out hard.
I put on muscle and I gained strength, and it came as a result of
thousands of hours of training. It was not easy, but it was worth it.
Too big?
One thing that always made me laugh during my training years was when
someone who was not exercising regularly would tell me: “I don’t lift
weights because I don’t want to get too big.” I would just smile
whenever someone said that to me. They had no idea that the problem they
envisioned would not happen overnight. In fact, it would take more time
and effort than they could ever have imagined. There may be other
reasons not to lift weights, but “getting too big” is not one of them.
Getting too big is what I call a good problem to have. Your journey to
bigness would involve regularly going to the gym, eating right, sleeping
well and getting healthy. And if your muscles really did start popping
out of your gym clothes, you could use the mirror to guide you on how
much you needed to ease up on the weights.
There are problems we definitely don’t want, and there are problems that
are good to have. We just need to look at the good problems differently.
Too in-demand?
I
love being with my wife, Dawn, and my little girls, Eliana and Ariela.
You can guess that I prefer not to travel more than I have to for
business. So I catch myself saying, “I don’t want to be a road warrior
who measures his success by the number of speaking engagements he has
all over the country. I don’t want to be speaking all the time.” What is
this? It’s a good problem to have. What’s a better way to look at it? I
want my writing and speaking to be so much in demand that I can choose
which of all those available speaking dates I want to accept and which
ones I can say no to (even though I am grateful for all the
opportunities).
Too popular?
Here’s another one of mine. I prefer to spend my professional time
writing, researching, speaking, recording and filming my work. So I find
myself saying, “I don’t want to spend all my time corresponding on the
social and business networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, and Linked
In.” What is this? It’s a good problem to have. Here’s a better way to
look at it: I want my columns, books, workbooks, CD programs, DVDs and
products to make such a positive impact on people’s lives that I am
invited to connect with more and more people from all around the world.
And you can bet that given all of this interest in my work, I would make
sure that I had a strategy to communicate with everyone.
Too much money?
And here’s one I hear a lot of people saying: “I don’t want to make a
lot of money if it means sacrificing the good things in my life.” What
is this? Yes, it’s another good problem to have. Here’s another way to
look at it: I want to be so good at what I love doing that people will
pay me handsomely to do it. I’ll then continue to do what I love, and
I’ll have all the time I want to spend with family and friends.
Your good problems
Now, what do you say negatively about the things that could possibly
make your life even more wonderful? What are your good problems to have?
How could you change your view of them? Consider re-orienting your
imagination from the downside of success to the upside of opportunity.
Another approach to the same issue could produce an eventual
breakthrough for you.
Remember, some problems are good to have.
David J. Pollay’s book,
Beware of Garbage Trucks!™, and his
CD program, Gratitude Is Everything!™, are due out this Fall. Mr. Pollay
is the creator of The Law of the
Garbage Truck™ (www.bewareofgarbagetrucks.com).
He is a syndicated columnist with the
North Star Writers Group,
creator and host of The
Happiness Answer™ DVD, and an
internationally sought after speaker. Mr. Pollay is the
founder and president of the personal coaching and seminar organization,
The Momentum Project (www.themomentumproject.com).
© 2008
David J. Pollay. Distributed by North Star Writers Group. May not be
republished without permission.
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