5 Ways to Break Through Your Own Limitations


comment now!

Sometimes it can seem as though you just cant go any further. You can’t break into a new niche… you can’t find that lucrative client… You want to keep growing, but can’t possibly take on any more business. Chances are, most of these roadblocks are limitations you’ve put on yourself. Here are a few ideas for breaking past them.

1. Are the limitations really there?
I love the phrase “think outside the box.” But it’s usually mis-used…as if there’s a box where we keep our same tired ideas, and inspiration is as easy as looking elsewhere. And that’s partly true.

But the phrase comes from a classic psychology test. Nine dots are arranged in three columns of three dots each. Subjects are asked to connect all nine dots with just three straight lines, without lifting the pen from the page. The only solution is to extend the line outside the matrix, but it almost never happens, because the brain “assumes” that the entire puzzle exists inside the confines of the 9 by 9 grid.

The real meaning of “outside the box” isn’t that your box contains tired old ideas. It’s that your box doesn’t even exist. What constraints are you unconsciously placing on your own growth?

2. Shift Perspectives
Borrow brilliance. You may not know what to do next. But someone, somewhere does. Just ask yourself “how would they do it?” How would Einstein solve this problem? Dr. Seuss? Elvis? A toothpick? Often the question alone is enough to springboard your mind onto entirely new trains of thought.

3. Learn a new skill
Maybe it’s not that you can’t do it. Maybe you just don’t know how yet? The internet is a wondrous place. There is a wealth of free tutorials on almost any subject. And if that’s enough, the catalog of university courses grows on an almost daily basis. Take advantage of it now.

4. Make the limitation obsolete
Sometimes, you’re right. You simply can’t do what needs to be done. Of course, you don’t really want to do what needs to be done, you want the result of having done it. So step back a bit and find a new way to achieve the same result.

5. Outsource the problem
You may not know how to do what needs to be done. But someone somewhere does. Even better than imagining how they’d do it…bring them on board and pay them to do it for you. There’s no shame in asking for help.

|comment now!

Comments

Leave a Reply