Introduction :

In our life, we face obstacles steadily, we are paralyzed, we wish that we can overcome them but
finally we can’t do nothing. We all have a different obstacles, and each of them is unique but we all
have the same sentiments : Confusion, fear, depression.

We know what to do but something blocks our path, we’re unhappy with our routine (relationship
with people, job …) no one show us how to overtake our obstacles, Many celebrities like Rockfeller,
Obama, or Abraham Lincoln did their best to eliminate their problems. How ? what’s their secret ?

The answer of these questions is : They find a way to transform an obstacle into an opportunity i
mean a weakness into a strenght. The author tries to share with us how to face the obstacles, how to
reach your goal even with obstacles in your road. He shows us how to turn a negative situation we
encounter in our lives into a positive one.

Nowdays, the majority of our obstacles are internal not external. To face obstacles, we should follow
a three critical steps, perception, action and the will, if we work with these 3 disciplines we can
create an openings whetever the door is shut then we learn how to handle our obstacles.

Part 1 :
Perception is the manner that we see what happened around us, it can be a source of strength and a
weakness as well. With perception, we will be able to fight obstacles because it gives us a
tremendous strength.

The discipline of perception :

John Rockefeller was a book-keeper at the begining and then an oilman in Ohio, his father was an
alcoholic criminal who had abondoned his family, the young Rockefeller got his first job when he was
16 (in 1855), after 2 years (1857), a massive national financial crisis hitted severely ohio, many
businessses have been affected by this catastrophic situation. At the beginning, the young man was
depressed, but the positive point is he had a cold blood, he kept his head while everyone else lost
theirs. He prefered to look at the crisis as an opportunity in order to learn. He had the strength to
resist no matther the gravity of the situation. He made and earned a lot of money because he could
see what others could not.

We will come across abstacles in our lives and we will learn, no matters what the obstacle is, the
most important is how to see it, how to react to it. People are different some sees a crisis, on the
other hand some sees an opportunity, our reactions are functions of our perceptions. We need to
stop seeing problems as a problems, we need really to focus on what things really are.

Recognize your power :

Rubin Carter a fighter for the middleweight was harshly accused of a crime that he did not commit,
he went to prison he was very angry, it’s a normal reaction but he quickly understand that anger was
not constructive so he refused to act wrongly, every minute in jail was spent reading books,
philosophy and history, after many years in prison, he walked out and resumed his life normally,
Carter did not request an apology from the court. He already understood that in life there are plenty
of misjudgement but we have to control our reactions and our emotions.
Steady your nerves :
Sometimes we are under pressure for exemple in the job, the boss is making us do all the work,
we’re not in our comfort zone, we feel like we cannot handle anymore. The risk of being intimidating
or overwhelmed is always there. In these moment, grace and praise are the solution.

Control your emotions :

When people panic they make mistakes, they ignore rules and they stop thinking clearly, the
astronauts for example when they went to the space, of course they are very scary, fortunately they
are able to control their fears, their emotions and then the stress is gone. It’s true that obstacles
make us emotional but the only way to overcome them is to keep control on our emotions. So we
can focus our energy on solving problems. The question that we need to ask ourselves is : Should we
freak out about this ? the answer is no, we can control ourselves.

Practice objectivity :
The difference between perceiving and observing is the intensity perceiving is more accurate than
observing. We can see things as they really are, perception is the problem because it gives us some
details that we don’t need really.

Objectivity means we are not in the equation, in other words, for example when we give some tips to
our friends, their problems are crystal clear for us and the solutions are obvious.

Alter your perspective :

Perspective is everything, when we see something from different angles, it loses its power over us.
Sometimes, we’re scary of obstacles because our perspective is wrong, perspective can change our
reaction comletely, we choose how we will look at things. With a wrong perspective we become
overwhelmed with something actually quite small, the right perspective has a weird way of reducing
obstacles. When we felt weak we do realize we’re strong, with perspective we discover the strength
we didn’t know we had. Perception precedes action, right action follows the right perspective.

Is it up to you :
Tommy john is a baseball player, the most durable pitchers, 26 seasons, it’s a magnificient record,
during this period, he had a bad injury called a dead injury which means game over. His doctor has
said that he had just 1% of chance of coming back after surgery, with rehab and training, he came
back more stronger and he won more than 164 games. Tommy john focused on what he can change
to be better and better that’s where he makes a difference, that’s the difference between people
who can accomplish great things and people who find it hard to achieve them.

Live in the present moment :

Most people start from nothing and finally do just fine, because they took things day by day, that’s
the real secret, they just focus on the moment and forget what’s gonna happen after. Our problem is
that we’re always trying to understand what things mean. Some people said, i’ll live in the present,
what they have to do is to work at it, remember this moment is not our life is just a moment of
ourlives.
Think differently :
Steve jobs was pretty much ambicious, he wanted from his engineer designer to build a mouse,
Steve Jobs had a high expectations, The engineer told Steve that what he wanted wasn’t realistic and
wouldn’t work unfortunately. Steve knew that to aim low meant to accept a mediocre achievement,
but a high aim could create something amazing, Steve Jobs had a different view, his perception
determine what is he and isn’t capable of. And that’s what make difference between normal people
and artists, artists have different view because they see things differently.

Finding the opportunity :

There is good in everything, we just have to look for it, sometimes we’re blind we didn’t see the gift
just close to us, every situation is an opportunity for us.

Prepare to act :
In our head we think that problems are so bad,, in fact, they are precisely as bad as we think, once
we see the problem as it is, for what it is, we must act.

Part 2 :
Step by step, action by action, we’ll be able to overcome the obstacles in front of us, with
perseverence and serenity we will act in the right way in order to accomplish our goals. Action
requires courage. The decisions that we took every single day determine who we are, we must be
sure to act with persistence.

The discipline of action :

Demosthenes was destined to become the greatest orator of Athens, he lost his father when he was
7, and then things got worse. He was abondoned by people he depended on, when he grow up, he
learned how to become much stronger, he learned from every situation, every moment, every
conversation, for him it was an opportunity to improve his art. Every speech he said made him
powerfull, every day that he spent made him determined, he changed his rage and his past into a
success, it’s so sad that so many of us fail prefering not to act, stop thinking, stop complaining, stop
arguing, just act, act and act. And that’s what Demosthenes did, in life it doesn’t matter how many
problems we have or where they come from, it matters what we will do what will give, no one wants
to be blocked behind obstacles or victimized, each obstacle we overcome makes us stronger for the
next one.

Get moving :
Amelia Earhart wished to be a pilot, unfortunately for her,in her generation, she was living in a
patriarchal society, she couldn’t have a job as a pilot, so she decided to took a job as a social worker.
A few days later, a man called her to give her a proposition, it was about a job as a pilot, she
answered yes, and she took the job, Amelia was the first woman to fly solo nonstop across the
atlantic. Life can be frustrating, but when we get an opportunity, we need to be realistic and move to
exploit it, we need to be more aggressive, pressing ahead, we have to take risk, we have to move
faster, if it is not the case we will face many obstacles in our lives. We always need to move forward.
Practice persistence :
If we are stuck by an obstacle, and we want to overcome it, we need to keep trying harder until it is
gone, persistence and resistance are the solutions.

Once we start attacking an obstacle, giving up is not an option, just persist and resist, only by
persisting and resisting we can learn how to follow our dreams. It’s okey to be discouraged,
frustated, it’s not okey to quit, just try all the ways, that’s persistence.

Iterate :
Failure can be an asset if what we’re trying to do is improve, problems become opportunities, we get
stronger by failures, Our capacity to try, to iterate is linked with our ability and tolerance to fail, each
of us, when we succeded in something, it’s always precented by failures possibly many times, action
and failure are two sides on the same path, one doesn’t come without the other, what stop this
conncetion is when people stop acting, because they consider failure as a bad thing.

Follow the process :

The process is a matter of steps, in general, the process is about finishing, we need just to act in a
right way, we don’t need to panic, we need to conserve our energy and be responsable to follow the
process, when we are engaged in process, we’re scary to fail, it’s totally normal, but we know that
some problems are harder than others. The process is about doing things right, right now.

Do your job, do it right :

Each of us is born without nothing, but after many years, we become engineer, pilot,doctor, architect
… It’s all about hard work, honesty and helping others as much as we can, each and every job
requires our best, then we can be proud of our choices because we did our job whatever it is.

Duty is inspiring, magnificent and empowering, it requires pride and dedication. In every situation,
life is asking us a question, and our actions are the answer. Our job is simply to answer well.

What’s right is what works :

We’ve got a mission to accomplish or a goal to achieve, we’re between the way we wish things were
and the way they actually are, just we’ve to do the best with what we’ve got, it’s not about changing
the world right at this moment, we have to think progressively and do things right.

In praise of the flank attack :

George washington was one of the most popular president of the USA, he was calm, a good thinker,
often refuse to battle, he never attack as the enemy would expect, he had a powerful sence of
victories. In war, Geoge Washington was strategical, tactical more than offensive. This method forces
him to be more creative, it’s like the martial arts, we do ignore attacking, once the opponent is
loosing the balance then we make our move, we’re acting like a real strategist, believe it or not it’s
the best strategy because it allows us to conserve our energy in order to attack the enemy at the
right time.

Use obstacles against themselves :

Sometimes, it’s clever to let the obstacles attacking you rather than attack them, it’s better to use
power of opposites, nonaction can be action it allows us to use the power’s enemy as our power,
maybe your enemy is insurmountable, perhaps in this case, we haven’t got the ability to win against
it, but we must never give up, no matter how much we try, in some way we have to use the enemy’s
energy to help ourselves. So instead of fighting obstacles, find a way of making them defeat
themselves.

Channel your energy :

Adversity can hurt us or it can help us to be better if we exploit it in a good way. We need to turn our
obstacles into an openings, we all have our own constraints to deal with, we can put them to good
use, it can power our actions, become much stronger and better.

Size the offensive :

Barack obama became the president of the USA in 2009, but before that, he struggled a lot in his
compaign, he turned one of the lowest moments into a surprise offensive, he took the things in his
hands and decided to give a speech to the Americans people, this speech was a transformable
moment in his career, when bad moments come, people expect that we’re gonna be weak, loosing
control but what Obama did was quite the opposite, he acted differently swiftly with arguments.

Prepare for none of it to work :

More often we act correctly, we respond clearly, we look for an opportunity and make it real but
what we cannot do is to control the world around us at least not like we would like to, then we fail
even if our actions were right.

But we can turn the bad situation upside down by using it as an opportunity to learn some more
skills, try with everything we’ve got and let’s see if it’s gonna work or not, just be ready to accept the
final verdict.

Part 3 :
The will is our internal power, it cannot be threatened by the external world.

The true will is related to humility and flexibility, the actions is what we do the will is what we lean
on.

The discipline of the will :

Abraham Lincoln was going through a dark period in his life, he attepmted to suicide in two
occasions, he was in a deep depression, indeed he struggled to manage this heavy burden that often
felt impossible to lift. These challenges were the experience that prepared him for greater things. He
was patient because he knew that difficult things took time, Lincoln’s real strength was his will.
Leadership requires determination and energy, he was able to lead, to hold a nation, because the will
is a discipline of the heart and soul, the will is the only thing that we can control completely, always.
He was decisive and strong as a leader, so we can always prepare ourselves for more difficult
situations, accept what we’re unable to change and persevere.

Build your inner citadel :

Theodore Roosvelt spent a horrible moments in his short life, he was fragile, flimsy, he suffered from
asthma, one day, Theodore Roosvelt’s father came into his room and give him a message that
changed the young boy’s life, this message was about his body and how he can make it to battle this
illness.
Roosvelt follows his father’s tips and become stronger then he built muscle, after five years he
recovered. When he was a president of the USA, he faced a lot of obstacles, from his opponents
especially, and once he survived an assassination attempt, he was strong because of his early
training, he overcame the obstacles. He built the inner citadel, in other words, the fortress inside of
us that no external adversity can ever break down, so he was completely protected, in a good times,
we stretength ourselves and bodies so we protect our inner citadel so it may protect us. To roosvelt
life was like an arena and he was the gladiator, in order to survive, he needed to be stronger resilient
ready for anything, in our own life we are all in the same position Roosvelt was in.

Anticipation ( Thinking negatively ) :

Our world is built by external factors, promises aren’t kept, you rarely get what you deserve, we have
to make concessions for the world around us, we are dependent on other people, people are going
to screw up our plans, the only thing we can do to overtake this issue is anticipation, because the
only variable that we’re able to control is ourselves. Anticiaption doesn’t make things easier
nevertheless we are prepared for them to be as hard as they actually are. With anticipation we have
time to raise defenses we can endure we are prepared for failure and ready for success. More aften
we need to achieve a goal, we invest time, money and other things valuable. In the end something
bad happens by surprise we get frustrated because unexpected failure is discouraging it’s like
bandages, they hurt only when torn away.

The art of acquiescence :

Thomas Jefferson was an orator, writing was his strength, he wrote one of the most important
documents in history, however he was a terrible public speaker, sometimes constraints in life are a
good thing especially if we accept them, they allow us to develop our skills, so we have to allow some
accidents to happen to us, acceptance is the solution, in other words we can call it the art of
acquiescence.

Love everything that happens : Amor fati

To do great things, we’ve got to love what we do good and bad, we have to learn to find joy in every
single thing that happens, our obstacle may not be violent, but we have to understand that certain
things particulary bad things are outside our control, we need just to face them with a smile and
cheerfulness. Indifference and acceptance are certainly better than disappointment and rage. We
don’t get to choose what happens to us but we can always choose how to feel about it.

Perseverence :
Perseverence is more difficult than persistence, we can solve some difficult problem with
persistence, then people called us persistent, but perseverence in something more larger, it’s about
keep trying until the end. Life is not about one obstacle but many, we’ll face every obstacle until we
solve it. Persistence is an action, perseverence is a matter of will, one is the energy and the other is
endurance, our actions can be blocked, but our will can’t be.

Something bigger than yourself :

We must never lower ourselves to being a person we don’t like, there is no better time than the
present, the present is our tremendous opportunity for us, we need to help each others to achieve
our goals because shared purpose gives us strength, sometimes we’re personally stuck by a problem,
the best way to face it is by creating opportunities and think about the loved ones, we have to stop
making it harder for ourselves by thinking about us, we have to start thinking : Unity over self, , we
have to help ourselves by helping others.

Meditate on your morality :

A frenchman called Montaigne is one of the most famous writers in Europe, he had a traumatic
accident, he was so close from death, he was aware of his own mortality, this tragedy gave him a
huge energy and he became powerful, he wasn’t afraid from  death and that’s propably help him to
move on with his life, death is something normal it’s gonna happen one day, it’s something that we
cannot stop it, we should be ready when that moment comes.

Prepare to start again :

In life there is a succession of obstacles, it never stops, when we overcame an obstacle another
emerges, this keep life interesting because this creates opportunities, the more we achieve the more
things will stand in our path. Life is a marathon not a sprint, just conserve our energy, we must act
with creativity, we need to be excited, cheerful and eager for the next battle.