Ep #317: Mid-Year Reboot: Overcoming Obstacles

Hello empowered principals. Welcome to episode 317. 

Welcome to The Empowered Principal® Podcast, a not so typical educational resource that will teach you how to gain control of your career and get emotionally fit to lead your school and your life with joy by refining your most powerful tool, your mind. Here’s your host certified life coach Angela Kelly Robeck. 

Hello, my empowered leaders. Happy Tuesday, I am so excited that you are experiencing the Mid-Year Reboot. I have been sharing a little clip from each of the sessions. For those of you who joined EPC by the end of January, you will have full access to all of the Mid-Year Reboot recordings for an entire year. So you can listen and really listen and take notes and replay. 

You have access to the workbooks, the training videos, everything, not to mention, you’ll have weekly live support from me as your coach for an entire school year when you join the Empowered Principal® Collaborative. So I really encourage you. Now is the time. Please do not wait until the end of the school year because that is decreasing your momentum. We want to continue momentum. Being in the Empowered Principal® Collaborative generates momentum every single week. It’s sustainable momentum. It’s not too much momentum. It’s not too little. It’s just right. Join us. 

So today’s clip is on how to overcome obstacles and objections and the difference between obstacles and objections. Obstacles are situations that we view as a problem. They are the blocks in the way, the problems, the issues, the challenges that we face. Then we have thoughts about those obstacles. Those are the objections our mind offers us as the reason or the excuse as why we cannot overcome the obstacle. So please enjoy this episode of the Mid-Year Reboot on objections and obstacles and how to overcome them. I’ll see you on EPC.

So here’s the truth about obstacles. They are an essential part of your journey. There is a reason your brain tapped into this fourth grade dynamic. Energetically you were like I’m getting a vibe here that I don’t like. I can see my new teacher is in tears, but they’re not speaking up. They’re just speaking with their nonverbals. They’re shutting down. 

You can see they look afraid. You can feel the energy of the veteran teachers who aren’t happy with new energy coming in, new ideas, new ways, new approaches, new offerings. They want to do it a different way. You can feel the vibe, right? 

That problem. One, your brain caught on to it for a reason. And number two, the reason that it’s an obstacle is it’s because you’re new, and you’ve never done this before. So you don’t know the how. I don’t know how to talk to them. I don’t know how. Should I just go in and move them without conversation? Should I go in and give them a direct feedback? Should I come in and just ask them questions and let them figure it out? Should I just leave it be? I don’t know how.

The obstacle is there for you to learn the how, right? When kids come to school, they don’t know how to be students. I taught kindergarten for 15 years. Those kiddos, especially ones that hadn’t been in pre-K, they didn’t know how to be a student, how to be in school. That was my job to show them how. 

They had to come and not know how to line up and get it wrong and not know how to get a pencil and not know how to sit on the carpet or circle time. They didn’t know how to play the games. They didn’t know how to write, read, add. They didn’t know any of that, but they just keep showing up. Keep showing up. Keep figuring it out day by day. Like oh, now I get it. Now I get it. Now I get it. Oh, this is easy. I know how to do this. 

The obstacles are the evolution. They are the learning. I like to think of my obstacle like a strength trainer, like gym fitness trainer, right? I think of obstacles as conditioning. It conditions me or strengthens me to evolve us. That’s what overcoming objections and obstacles are. The obstacle is the exterior thing, the objection is the interior part. We have to be able to overcome the objection to be able to overcome the obstacle. 

So overcoming our objections so that we can overcome external obstacles, is the process of strengthening and conditioning and training and testing us to evolve and grow and learn about ourselves and to build up our capacity to solve that obstacle to overcome it so that we can be prepared for the next level. We’re going to drive the bus, obstacle. We work, work, it slows us down. We have to build those muscles. Rest, recover, build, build, build. We finally, now we’re lifting, able to lift 50 pounds instead of 25 pounds. Now we can lift 50 pounds. 

Now we’re back in the bus. We’re lifting 50 pounds, 50 pounds. But wait a minute, there’s a new obstacle. Oh my gosh. 70 pounds. Are you kidding me? Ah, okay. Work, work, work. Condition, evolve, test. Yep. I know how to lift 70 pounds now. Bus keeps driving, on and on and on. Right? 

So the truth about objections, the objections, the internal part. There’s the obstacle out here. There’s an objection in our mind as to why we can’t solve it. The truth of handling objections is that we have to question those thoughts. So what overcomes objections is questioning them. 

Is it true that I can only lift 25 pounds? Is it true that a car cannot be turned over from its top back onto its tires from the roof of the car? Is that true that it can’t happen? I watched it before my very eyes. I did not think it was possible. 

For me, it might have been impossible given my current muscle tone and my size and my age or whatever. There were only two of us. It would have been a young man and myself versus a young man and two big burly dudes who were able to rock this car back onto its tires, and the guy just took off. Is it true that it’s impossible? 

Maybe it feels impossible right now. But imagine if maybe I was back in my 30s when I was an avid runner, avid working out seven days a week. I was strong in my 30s. I was a gym rat. I was a runner. I had bulk and muscle. I was in tip top shape. If I was in that moment of my life, and I had some of my gym friends with me, we might have saw that car, thought we can solve this, and we might have been able to do it. 

Any objection that you have in your brain, you must question it. Is it true that the fourth grade team is a problem? Yes or no? Why do I think yes? Why is it a problem? Write down the reasons. Then why are those things a problem? You might decide yes, it is a problem because it’s causing this, this, this, and this? Those are a problem because this, this, this, and this. I would like to solve the core issue. Yes, it’s a problem. I’m going to label it as a problem. 

Or you might say actually I was observing their collaboration, and I don’t know that it’s really a problem. I think we just have a miscommunication. I don’t see veteran teachers taking control. I don’t see discomfort to the point of breakdown or shut down with my new teachers. I just see like a miscommunication happening. This isn’t a big problem. It’s just a conversation. 

So it’s not really a problem, or it’s not a problem at all. I saw a veteran teacher snap at a new teacher. I saw that interaction. I checked in with everybody. They both apologized. They’d had a moment. I didn’t have all the information. Everything was fine. I thought it was a problem. But when I checked in, it wasn’t a problem. 

You will have to question because your brain is going to make an assumption. One interaction in fourth grade, oh my gosh, it’s a problem. Is it really? Maybe it is. Maybe you have collected evidence, and that evidence has shown you additional evidence and that evidence has shown you even more evidence. There’s like this one thing, it’s going to solve this whole funnel of issues. Then it’s something you want to address. You can label it as a problem if you want. 

Then you ask yourself like okay, if I have identified that as the core problem, what’s in my way of solving it? Those are all the objections, but the objections are just thoughts. I can’t do it because this, this, this. Why is that true? Is it true you can’t do it because of that? Is it true because you’re a first year principal that you can’t hold a conversation with your fourth grade team? Is that true? Or is it just uncomfortable? 

What you’ll find with objections is that objections are an attempt to avoid a negative emotion or a perceived negative emotion. Like you perceive you might feel that at some point, and you don’t want to feel that. So I don’t want to talk to fourth grade because it’s possible that they might be really upset and offended and hurt. Negative emotion. I don’t want people to feel these negative emotions so I’m not going to hold this conversation. 

Meanwhile, you’re feeling the negative emotions because you’re not holding the conversation. You’re afraid if you do hold the conversation, you’re going to be uncomfortable. They’re going to be upset. Then in return, you’re going to experience more discomfort in the form of they’re going to talk behind your back, or they’re going to go to the superintendent, or they’re going to disagree with you, or they’re going to push back. 

Now you’re feeling more negative emotion than you were even before you said something. So you feel like you shouldn’t even have said something. You should have just let it go. But also letting it go feels uncomfortable because you see the dynamic that’s going on, and no one’s happy in the fourth grade. You feel kind of stuck, right? You’ve got to question the objections that your brain offers you. 

I want to offer you a thought that whatever you’re dealing with right now. Remember, I asked you to think about something you’re dealing with right now. Think about what you’re dealing with right now, and remind yourself that where you’re at right now, whatever problem you’re facing right now, was not a problem that you faced a year ago, or two years ago, or three years ago. It wasn’t in existence, this problem that you’re having right now. 

In fact, one, two, or three years ago, you were dealing with other problems. Let’s say you’re a second year principal. Four years ago, three years ago, you were dreaming. You were aching to be in this position. You were aching to be a school leader. You wanted it so bad. You’d gone through the credentialing program, you got your masters, you took the test, you had your admin license in hand, and you were waiting for a job offer that offered you a leadership position. You interviewed and you interviewed, and you were just so aching for this moment to be a school leader. 

Three years later, lo and behold, here you are. This beautiful, perfect moment right now, this problem you’re facing, the objections in your brain. This is a dream come true from three years ago. You dreamed this day would happen. But what you didn’t think to dream about or to consider in the dream was the whole package. 

When you were aching to be a principal and longing to be in the position, you were dreaming about the beautiful parts, the easy parts, the fun parts, the productive parts, the wins, the successes, the influence, the impact, the growth, the celebrations, the love, the acknowledgement. You were thinking about all of that, the good part, the fun part. What we weren’t considering was the really hard days. 

We’re like yeah, I know there’ll be hard days, but it’s worth it. Yeah, it’s like I know that having a baby is going to be painful. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but it’s worth it. But then you get to the moment of birth, and you’re like oh, I don’t know about this is. Is it possible to turn around? Is it possible to knock me out and just give me this baby when it’s all said and done? This is really painful. I knew it was going to hurt. I didn’t know it was going to hurt this much. I didn’t know it was going to take this long. I really, really, really want that baby, but I also really, really, really don’t want to be in pain. 

This moment right now is your dream come true. You’re in a position that somebody else out in the world is dreaming, aching, longing for. They wish they had the problem you had right now. You’re thinking have it. It’s not as easy as it looks right? It doesn’t feel good. 

But I want you to consider, I wanted this. Your desire to be a school leader, your desire to create impact, your desire to contribute to the world in bigger ways, bolder ways, more impactful ways. The challenges, the obstacles come along with that. Those are the requirements. They’re kind of like the price of admission to have that success. You’ve got to go through this obstacle and then this one and then this one, but then you’ll eventually get there. 

It’s like yesterday, I was talking about my son and I. We drove from LA to Nashville, and we had to go through the process to get there. We never doubted we were going to get there, but we had rainstorms. We had some construction. There was a big semi accident where it flipped over and the road was blocked. We had obstacles along the way. Got low on gas, we had to stop. We were starving, we had to eat. We took some detours because we wanted to, and it was really fun. We let the trip take longer on purpose. 

You’re going to have obstacles. They’re supposed to be there. If you can just allow them to be a part of the dream come true experience and be like oh yes, I wished for this. I wish to be a school leader. Now here I am sitting on the school leader throne, and it comes with its school leadership throne problems. Okay, fair enough. I’m in. I’ll take it. I’ll handle these. 

So when you’re in your dream come true and the obstacles happen, they aren’t a problem. They are essential. The brain loves to solve problems. The brain loves to like, is there a problem? It’s always actually looking for problems to solve because it gets such a fix, such a hit of highness, of happiness when it solves the problem. You know what I’m talking about? I’m like this around the house, right? Something is broken. Oh, I can’t wait to go get the glue and fix it. 

It feels so good to solve the problem, especially if it’s something I’m not very competent in. Like, my husband taught me how to like, we were in our old house. We were changing out all of the outlets. He’s an engineer, but he knows all this electric stuff. He does it no problem. I’m like do you want me to help you? There’s like a million of these in the house. But I’m scared because I don’t do electricity. 

He’s like, first of all, electricity is off. You’re not going to get electrocuted. I’ve tested everything. He’s very meticulous. He showed me how. I felt like a little kid, this such excitement out of solving and being able to do this little task that he thought nothing up. He was just going around the house. I maybe got two done to his five or six. But the pride that I felt from learning how to do that task was just crazy. 

So when you’re in a learning curve, and you feel new and clumsy and uncomfortable, you can feel embarrassed that you don’t know because you’re new, or it can be like a little kid. Like this is fun. This is light. It’s valuable to be in that zone. The obstacles aren’t there to punish you. Like to slow you down to get to Nashville late. To slow down your school, to punish you to make you feel incompetent. That’s not what the obstacle’s there for. 

We think of it that way sometimes. Like oh, why is this happening to me? I never get what I want. The obstacle is there for you to condition and strengthen you. It’s a valuable part of the process of the journey because the journey is the goal. 

So when your bus comes up around a boulder, it’s like oh, there’s something I need to learn or grow or solve or fix. I’m going to overcome this. It doesn’t mean that nothing’s going well. The overwhelm cycle just means I’m in a learning period, and I have to spend some effort and energy and time here. But this is equally valuable as the drive. Getting the boulder out of the way or getting the car back onto its wheels, that is just as valuable, if not more, than just driving.

Sure, there are days where you drive straight through. It’s a wonderful day. It’s a perfect commute. No problems, no obstacles, lovely. But if that was happening every single day of life, your brain would ache for a problem to solve. Actually what happens is our brain will actively make problems, create problems so that it has something to solve. 

Overwhelm cycles are necessary. They are a necessary part of your success cycle. So success is here you’re at now. You’re successful. You wanted to become a school leader, and you’re becoming a school leader. You are a school leader. Success. Check the box. I have won the game of trying to become a school principal. I’m at the end of the board game of life, and I’m a school principal. Here I am. Now I’m in the bus driving, and there’s another obstacle. Like we’re trying to get here.

What did I use yesterday? 62%. We’re trying to get to 80. But at 69%, there is a roadblock. What happened? We thought we were going to make it to 70, but we only got to 69. Why? What happened? We’ve got to problem solve here. 

But what we’re going to start, instead of just like hacking away at the boulder, we’re going to say wait, what got us from 62 to 69? We had a seven point increase. What worked? How do we go from 62 to 69? Let’s see if we can apply any of what worked to get us to 70, to help us around this boulder. 

Then we can study, what do we think got in the way? What did we not anticipate solving ahead of time for, and what can we do for next year to get us across that threshold, right? So it takes us a year to figure this out and then we try again, and we wait to see. Did we get around the boulder? Did we remove the boulder? Did we get the bus flipped back up on its tires and get around? Sometimes it takes us a year to figure that out. It’s necessary. 

If you never had the obstacle you wouldn’t know what worked and what didn’t. You wouldn’t have to evaluate what worked, what didn’t, what am I going to do differently? The struggle that comes with obstacles and overcoming your mental objections is the beginning of a new, your next level, your highest level success cycle. So the overwhelm cycle becomes the beginning the new success cycle. So as you’re going through a series of overwhelms, what you’re doing is generating a new cycle of success. 

Because basically between obstacles, it’s obstacle, obstacle, obstacle, success. There’s nine times more obstacles than successes. But if the journey is the goal, obstacle, struggle, work, figure it out, win, a little more, drive, smooth sailing. Oh, another obstacle. Work, struggle, figure it out, ah win. Then the end game isn’t the only win. You get to win, win, win with every obstacle. 

As you transition into new situations and new obstacles, you’re going to have a new set of objection thoughts. I’ve noticed my objection thoughts tend to be the same. They just reapply, cut and paste to different problems, right? With money, oh, big, big problem. Cut and paste. Oh, this? Big, big problem. But what’s interesting is there some parts of my life where it’s like oh, that’s just totally easy. If I thought about money like I think about time, I’d be a millionaire. 

So I have to apply what is working in my life. Like I’m very productive with my time, very efficient with my time. I have beautiful thoughts. I have a beautiful relationship with time. Transfer those to money, transfer those to leadership, transfer those to anything you want to master.

Hey empowered principal. If you enjoyed the content in this podcast, I invite you to join the Empowered Principal® Collaborative. It’s my latest offer for aspiring and current school leaders who want to experience exceptional impact and enjoy the school leadership experience. 

Look, you don’t have to overwork and overexert to be a successful school leader. You’ll be mentored weekly and surrounded by supportive like minded colleagues who truly understand what it means to be a school leader. So join us today and become a member of the only certified life and leadership coaching program for school leaders in the country. Just head on over to angelakellycoaching.com/work-with-me to learn more and join. I’ll see you inside of the Empowered Principal® Collaborative. 

Thanks for listening to this episode of The Empowered Principal® Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode and want to learn more, please visit angelakellycoaching.com where you can sign up for weekly updates and learn more about the tools that will help you become an emotionally fit school leader.