A Mason's Work

In our last episode we talked a lot about risk tolerance and using risk to help you

develop trust in yourself.

And I want to move from that to perhaps maybe a more nuanced understanding of what that

really means when it comes to suffering versus challenge, right?

So the risks that we undertake that are going to help us grow are choices that we're making

positive choices to stretch yourself.

Maybe you're going to do something you've never done before.

Maybe you're going to try and beat a personal record.

Maybe you're going to try and learn a new skill.

There are other times in your life that are you have situations that you have not chosen.

Uncomfortable situations, painful situations.

Things that come up in everyday life that are a form of adversity.

Adversity is another opportunity to develop that trust in yourself, but it is unselected.

So you have a little bit less sort of perceptual control over that adversity that doesn't make

it any less of an opportunity to grow and develop, but you're developing essentially a constitution,

the ability, the resilience to kind of endure these discomforts, whereas the selected

risks that you undertake are just a little bit different.

And so how do you know which is which?

It's an important question because sometimes we put ourselves consciously or unconsciously

in situations where we have to rise to the occasion.

When you choose these things, obviously, those are sort of the preferential stuff, right?

It's a little bit more comfortable to be able to choose.

When it's an unchosen adversity or an unchosen suffering, you have a different kind of approach

to learning through this.

And so what you might have to do as you experience these things is cultivate an openness to what

you can learn from this experience.

So something happens, you get a flat tire on the highway or you get injured in some way.

These kinds of things, and I hope they never happen to you, but I hope they happen to

you in the same way, right?

Because it's how you grow.

As these things come up, you have to be open to what they're willing to teach, what the

opportunity is for you to learn and grow.

What can you let go of in terms of the way you think things should be and surrender into

the moment of the discomfort that you're experiencing?

So when you are on the side of the highway with a flat tire, what can you learn to do?

Maybe you don't know how to change a tire.

Maybe you can figure that out, maybe in the situation at a time of dire need.

Maybe when you are in a situation like that, you learn to appreciate and embrace the time

you do have and how often it is easier by comparison to do what you want to do without

a flat tire.

Again, what you're open to and what you appreciate and what you experience is entirely up to

you and your willingness to trust in yourself that you will endure and survive and grow

potentially as a result.

It's these unforced, sort of suffering components, though, where you really get the opportunity

to, again, grow your constitution and grow your trust in yourself in a meaningful way.