Suffering is Optional by Krystal Zellmer

Revelation is such an incredibly powerful thing. Becoming aware of something you were previously unaware of provides you choice in places where you previously felt trapped. This is the ability to renew your mind. This is why discovering sunglasses is crucial to exponential growth. When we have sunglasses, ideas we buy as reality, that are driving us and we do not even know they are there, we are operating automatically through beliefs that may be holding us back. Some sunglasses work in life, some do not.

A set of sunglasses I have encountered often lately in my life, and in coaching others, is the belief that life is hard. The belief that our world right now is hard. The belief that things are difficult, and that life is a lot of work and that it may not work out. This mindset creates a lot of pain, struggle and exhaustion.

I am not suggesting that there are not things in life that may be hard. What I am suggesting is it does not have to ALWAYS be hard. You do not have to build it in. If it is hard, do it hard. There are things in life worth fighting for, that could be hard, and they are worth it. And, if you walk into a situation and you already believe that it will be difficult, guess what, it will be. You will create a hard experience based on what you believed would happen before you walked into the situation in the first place. You can turn a beautiful situation into a tough situation through your power of how you believe it will look. If you believe, “No pain, no gain,” you are literally requiring yourself to have pain to have gain. I don’t believe it has to be that way. You can gain with no pain!

On the flip side, if you will not attempt it because you want to avoid pain, and it COULD be painful, you never get to see the beauty of what’s possible when you get uncomfortable and try it anyway. What if you assumed there would be pain so you unconsciously avoided gain?

In a season when so many are in doubt, have anxiety, are weary, etcetera, why not choose to believe it could be joyful? What if it could be easy? Have you ever done something that you over-thought for far too long, and after you completed it you realize you wasted a lot of time and energy on something that turned out to be “not that bad?”

“Pain is real. Suffering is optional.” - Brian Klemmer

How can you change the story? How can you actively choose to believe good about an upcoming situation or circumstance? Can you view it as easy? Could you choose for it to be fun? Maybe you believe it’s a challenge and you’re up for it! What if it was even an opportunity? Today, and every day, remember you have a choice. You are in the driver's seat of your own life. You get to design it. I encourage you to design it in a direction that creates the greatest good for you, and everyone you influence.