Your Strengths Start Out As Weaknesses
Do you ever look back on something you thought was difficult, only to now believe it’s easy? The point is, we don’t start out in life with strengths set in stone. We start with an empty slate. Many people have natural abilities to some degree, but they still need to improve their weaknesses. It just doesn’t take them as long as others.
When you look at your strengths as something that was a weakness, you can take comfort in knowing your current weaknesses will someday be strengths. Of course, this is if you want to turn them into strengths. There may be reasons why you don’t want to put in the effort. There are only 365 days in a year, after all. We have other situations happening in our lives that cause us to put certain things on the back burner.
You should ask yourself how important are some of your weaknesses? Are they preventing you from obtaining your goals? If not, then ask if improving them would be nice to do, but not necessary. You can still live your life without getting better with those weak areas.
For instance, maybe you love the game of softball and have joined a league. But, you don’t have much time to practice, other than the two days per week the team meets up for that purpose. You are not a good player but enjoy the game. If you could become a stronger player that would be wonderful, but it isn’t something that’s going to change your life much.
On the other hand, if not having a certain skill is preventing you from getting a promotion, and that is important to you (it’s not for everybody), then you may want to focus on getting better at that skill.
This is when you use the strengths-once-were-weaknesses mindset. It helps you to figure out what steps you need to take to improve the current stage of your weakness. It can help you to determine the time needed to get it done. You will also need to understand what it will take to improve the weaknesses so that you can accurately measure your success. That’s not always as straightforward as we would like.
Talk to people who already have accomplished what you are trying to do. Ask questions about what they did to overcome those weaknesses, and see if they have any resources for you to take advantage of. This can get you where you want to be much quicker than going it alone.
Dorothy Biagioni
Executive Business and Life Coach
Transformational Leader and Speaker
Empowerment Life Coach and Mentor
Personal Development Coach
Keynote Speaker and Presenter
Certified Hypnotherapist
www.thegamechangerlifecoach.com