Is It A Character Flaw Or Missing Tools?

undesirable behavior like procrastination, overthinking, or distraction, scrolling your phone, is the product of not having enough emotional resilience to handle a specific obstacle that’s currently going on in your life.

that reframe was one of the most powerful things that changed my life, because what it does is it takes the burden off of the ideathat my lack of desirable behavior or proper behavior, consistently showing up on time, doing my work effectively, focusing deeply, all those things, instead of those being character flaws, as if I was a person who was a failure, or I was a person who was incapable of doing these things.

instead, it reframes that character flaw view or perspective into one of, “No, I am just not ready for this specific moment. I haven’t done the necessary training. I’m not equipped with the proper tools. I’m not in the right environment. The influences around me or inside of me are not supportive of me acting in the way that I wanted to in this moment, given the stress or emotional toll that I’m under in this moment.”

That is a very different perspective than I am not the type of person, or I am unqualified to do this thing, or I am incapable, or I am failing at this thing. No, you just don’t have enough reps. You just don’t have the right environment, the right lifestyle, the right behaviors, the right mindset, the right tools in place in order to support yourself through a specific thing.

If one of your friends was going through a deep traumatic experience and during that time they were not showing up to work on time, they weren’t very focused, you wouldn’t go, “Wow, you’re such an incompetent person who can’t focus.”

you’d probably be compassionate and say, “Okay, that’s happening. It’s true, you’re not focusing well and you’re not showing up to work on time. But it’s not because you’re incapable of doing those things, it’s because this experience right now that’s going on in your life is likely too much for you in this given moment, given the way that you used to operate, given the tools you used to use, given the environment you used to be in, given the people you are around.

You don’t have the right system in place in order to handle the deep emotional impact of this crisis that’s going on in your life.” you wouldn’t attack them as an incompetent and unfocused person, character assignment.

you would probably support them to say, “In this moment, you have more emotions going on, and that means if you want to handle this with a greater competency,” and greater competency in this perspective just means a greater ability to continue to act in a desirable way, regardless of what the emotional toll is of the thing or the crisis that’s going on in your life.

If you want to act in a more desirable way, then likely something that will help you is altering your environment and your lifestyle and the tools that you’re equipped with to give you a higher probability of being able to handle the emotional weight of this experience, but still take the desired action.

This is the reason why people Will choose to go to therapy or go to courses, or go to counseling or go to coaching, depending on the subject that they’re trying to improve on. Because having the right support in place that can be objective and give you the right tools to move through a certain obstacle increases your likelihood of even though the thing is still going on, the crisis is still occurring, you have a higher probability with the right tools and the right support to still take the action that you wanted to.

So the person who goes to therapy while they’re in a crisis likely has a higher probability of doing basic things in a way that they used to when they weren’t in the crisis, like going to bed at the right time and eating the right foods and establishing structure or boundaries around their focused work, even if it’s a bit more limited during this moment.

You alter your environment with the right support or tools in order to increase your competency in a given moment to handle a specific obstacle, no matter how emotional it is, such that you have a higher likelihood of acting in the way that you wanted to. It’s a behavioral problem. It’s a lifestyle problem.

It’s a prioritization problem, a clarity problem, an equipment problem of having the right tools in place, but it’s not a character flaw. These are different ways of looking at the exact same problem. The issue is one of them ends up in shame-based accountability, where you tell yourself you just need to try harder or that you should be able to do this or you have been able to do this in the past.

All of that feeds back into the negative feedback loops that end up in character assignment and character flaws, that end up in a perspective that I am a flawed person in this moment and I am incompetent or incapable of handling this thing with however much intensity it is occurring with.

And that sometimes works in the short term. But that shame-based gritty accountability is not an effective way of establishing long-term sustainable behavior change. Because every time a new thing comes up that knocks you on your ass, it becomes shame. You attack yourself. It’s a you problem, right? It’s because you are incapable or incompetent. No, you just don’t have the right tools in place, right? You just haven’t experienced this level of emotion yet.

you haven’t experienced this type of obstacle or crisis or whatever it is, It’s a behavior. It’s a lifestyle problem. It’s a prioritization problem. We need to equip ourselves in the right moment with the right tools in order to move through that obstacle. You haven’t experienced this yet, so how could you know exactly what you need?

I integrated this philosophy into my life, it changed my life because I no longer had to attack myself when I wasn’t operating as desirably as I would like to. I would look at a situation and think, “Wow, over the past week, I didn’t act in the way that I really would like to be acting.

This must be an experience that I’m not yet prepared for.” But that’s not a, “I can’t prepare for it,” or, “I’m not capable of handling it.” It is, ” I don’t have the right boundaries in place maybe,” right? “I need to be more strict in my boundaries for the next week. I’m not surrounded by the right people. I’m not asking the right questions.

I don’t have the technical competency yet to understand this problem,” right? So there might be a course there might be some way of gaining the information more effectively or more efficiently such that I can answer this question. There is a path to the place I want to get to as opposed to the prior perspective, which is there is no path.

there’s something wrong with me, and that’s not the case for the vast majority of obstacles in our life, especially with procrastination, distraction, overthinking, doom scrolling, things like that. They are behavioral problems that if you integrate the right support system and the right tools, you have a high likelihood of being able to handle the emotional load and not choose to distract yourself, not choose to overthink, not choose to scroll your phone, not scroll hinge or whatever the avoidant behavior is that you engage in,instead of doing the thing that you wanted to.

But it’s not you. You are not incapable of doing the thing. It’s just that you haven’t integrated the right tools yet or the right system yet in order to give yourself a higher probability of acting in the way that you wanted to, even when you are encountering an obstacle with an emotional intensity that you have not yet handled before

if that resonates with you, I would love to know what is a time where you experienced something that was really intense and when you had good behaviors, you ended up falling off track with them, and then you realize, you’re like, “Actually, I can.

I can handle this thing. It’s just that in this learning curve moment, I wasn’t able to continue to engage in the healthy behaviors that I like to engage in.” Or if you’re in that place right now where you continue to engage in behaviors that you don’t find to be desirable, you are losing your focus, you’re distracting yourself, and it’s been going on for a long time, let me know why. This is something I can help you. I have tools and resources that can directly support you with overcoming these obstacles.

So feel free to reach out, follow this channel, like this content, because I have lots of tools and resources that I can specifically support you with to increase your competency, your probability of moving through these emotional obstacles while still taking the action that you wanted to take.

I’m Flint from iAlign, and I look forward to hearing from you. Peace.