There are two kinds of difficulty we opt into in our lives and our businesses, usually unconsciously: desirable difficulty and unnecessary, undesirable difficulty.
Desirable difficulty is a concept related to what gamers know as HARD FUN. It’s the difficulty we choose, and delight in during the doing. It’s part of the engrossing, lose-track-of-time, drop in deep and just delight in the joy of DOING state of consciousness we call FLOW.
The other kind of difficulty is unnecessary, undesirable difficulty.
This kind of difficulty is based in fear.
It’s a tricky little way we subconsciously stop ourselves from doing the game-changing passion projects and life changes that scare us before we even get started.
We make things way harder than they need to be.
Over time, this kind of difficulty saves us from having to take the risks involved in doing our dreams.
Because you get perceived safety as a payoff, making things harder than they need to be becomes a pattern… an unconscious program you replay and recreate over and over again.
This kind of difficulty becomes a pattern… an unconscious program we replay and recreate over and over again.
This sort of difficulty–the totally unnecessary, unavoidable kind—shows up because we’re afraid of the glory of our own True Selves and Big Dreams, and because we’re even more afraid of how exposed and vulnerable we might will feel along the way.
It shows up because we’re afraid of rejection and aloneness, and because we’re afraid to even let ourselves fully want what we really want.
So we make doing our dreams much, much harder than it needs to be, proving our Inner Critic right which, in turn, keeps our books unwritten, our loves unexpressed, our liberated lives unlived and our callings unanswered.
This unnecessary, undesirable, dream-stealing difficulty shows up as difficulty we create by not seeing easier ways to do the tiniest tasks and the masterpiece project alike.
Unnecessary, undesirable difficulty looks like the habit of giving yourself a hard time about where you are right now, which creates turbulence within, saps the energy you need to create your future and makes everything feel SO DAMN HARD.
It shows up as perfectionism, the enemy of inspired ideas, joyful impulses and soul-deep callings.
It shows up as I’ll-do-it-myself syndrome when there is assistance all around us just pacing in the hall, chewing gum, waiting for us to open the door and receive it.
It shows up as choosing careers, relationships and lives that are misaligned with who you really are, which causes even the easiest thing to feel…difficult.
It shows up as a chronic habit giving yourself a hard time about where you are right now, creating a pervasive sense of turbulence within that saps the energy you need to create the future you desire, making literally every step feel SO hard.
It shows up as overthinking. Overplanning. Too much troubleshooting, too little trust. Not seeing how everything is experimental. Trying to hard to avoid unwanted outcomes. Trying too hard to get it all right under your own hard effort and power.
Here’s a House Rule of the Universe for when things start to feel too hard: The struggle FEELS real… but it’s not true.
What is true is that when you hit those moments of total alignment—thoughts, actions and emotions aligned… values, beliefs, identity and desires align… systems, relationships and environments align— nothing feels hard.
It feels like soaring on eagle wings, like when the bird catches a current and doesn’t have to flap at all but still soars higher, banks and turns, and coasts higher still.
It feels like you placed the cosmic order and now the phone starts ringing and the emails start pouring in, and the offers to work with people you love and who love you for wonderful pay just start showing up… and it feels easy.
It feels like all the dogs and all the babies and the lovers and the brilliant besties and the lovely neighbors itching to do sweet little favors for you… they all just show up and show out in wonderful ways.
It feels bustling and joyful. It feels smooth and warm. It feels open and love.
It feels pure and peace.
You feel solid and secure.
But you can’t ride the unnecessary difficulty bus and the pure peace and bustling joy bus at the same time, Brilliant One.
So today I want to offer you my go-to Spiritual Strategies for those seasons when I can feel myself missing the path of least resistance over and over again:
Spiritual Strategy #1 for these times is to take a freaking break and refuse to judge yourself for taking the break. Take a break from the subject. Take a nap. Take a vacation. Take a detour. Take a moment. Take a sacred pause. Put the topic on ice for a minute or a month. Light a candle or go have some fries and champagne. Or do both. Whatever works.
Spiritual Strategy #2 for getting off the struggle bus is to wake up in the morning, meditate and pray or do whatever you do to get your mind still, then write across the top of your journal these words: HOW EASY CAN I LET THIS BE?
Then, keep writing, brain-dump style and see what comes out.
And then, all day throughout the day, when things start feeling struggly, say to Spirit: LET THIS BE EASY.
And ask yourself again: HOW EASY CAN I LET THIS BE?
Spiritual Strategy #3 for un-struggling your life is something I use right after #2, and I call it the Unnecessary Difficulty Detector. I simply scan the struggle subject and note where I’m making things harder than necessary or where I’m doing something I could wait on, or could get help on.
This is where you get to build the muscle of shining the light of self-awareness without judging yourself for what you see.
Ask yourself:
- Where are you making things harder than necessary?
- Where are you adding false prerequisites?
- Where are you trying to do something without first being well-resourced (or well-rested)?
- Where are you not setting a boundary that would open space and ease?
- Where could you get some help or stretch your timelines and deadlines out?
- What are you telling yourself has to happen right now that… just doesn’t?
Once you see it, you can cease and desist the Unnecessary Difficulty-Making, even if that leaves a temporary gap where nothing is happening at all on the topic for a while.
In my experience, that gap is where Source/Spirit/God/All That Is/Divine Creative Power loves to show up, take the wheel and drive fast.
Struggle-Removing Spiritual Strategy #4 might surprise you. Take the topic of your angst and just jot down your 10 Favorite Things on the subject.
Under the spiritual law of attraction, what we focus on, we call in and build momentum around.
When we’re focused on what’s not working and we’re focused on fixing it, it almost always backfires, because what we think we’re fixing, we’re actually attracting more of.
That’s why our unwanted patterns continue… we keep them activated and relive the same script that got us into the unwanted situation in the first place.
But catch this principle: When we focus on our 10 Favorite Things, we call in more like that, too.
When you focus on your 10 Favorite Things about a person, or a topic, or your job, or your home, you upgrade the whole atmosphere and more components, more inspirations and more like your 10 Favorite Things begin to flow your way.
Last week, I was perseverating on something that felt super broken and I wasn’t sure what to do about it.
So I started to list out—on paper, in bullets and bad grammar—my 10 Favorite Things about the situation and every person involved in it.
I kid you not, before the day was over, someone I had never even met was texting me, offering me a beautiful solution to the problem.
Today, I want you to remember that the Divine Order path into your Biggest Dreams is decorated with moments of delectable, desirable difficulty of the flow-sparking sort…
And I want you to remember that the definition of soul-level calling includes:
- You’re not ready to do it, and
- You don’t have everything you need to do it,
- Yet.
And I want to invite you to close your eyes, let yourself imagine yourself living your #1 dream in a graceful, delightful way that is so purely emotional and not at all logistical.
And I want you to fall in love with that image or story or version of yourself.
And then I want you to make a decision with me today. A decision to shift the atmosphere. A decision to let it be easy. A decision to invite Spirit to show you the way.
I want you to pull out your Unnecessary Difficulty Detector and run it along in front of your steps into this future, as you take them.
I want you to let your addiction to hard dissolve, and let Divine Order light up the least-resistance steps instead.
Let yourself be guided. Know that the timing will be longer than you think it should be. Let that go, too. Divine needs that time to line it all up for you. Stand down. Let Spirit work.
Watch for signals and wait for inspiration to act. And stay out of fixing energy. Look for your favorite things.
Look for the moments that feel bustling and joyful… smooth and warm… open and love.
When you feel pure and peace and solid and secure, whisper to Source: MORE, PLEASE.
And let it find you.
Head up + heart out,
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Tara-Nicholle Kirke, MA, Esq.
The Inner Critic Coach™️
Founder + CEO of SoulTour
@taranichollekirke on FB | TW | IG | LI
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