If you keep floundering, you're probably missing a stroke.
I teach a class in resume writing, and I always use an exercise called "Assessing your Skills" from a wonderful book entitled, "What Color is Your Parachute.
" And every time I use the exercise, my students hate it.
To do this exercise successfully, my students need to follow a specific process.
First, they must remember seven things that they did for fun, excitement, adventure, or a sense of accomplishment.
Second, they must complete a three-page graphic designed to help them analyze each situation and discover the talents that they used in those situations.
Third, they use their answers from the graphic to priorities their talents and pick their top ten marketable skills.
Fourth, they use those skills to write the section of their resume titled "Professional Profile.
" Inevitably, most of my students struggle because they try to complete the assignment without doing each step.
I find them agonizing over their profile when they haven't bothered to analyze their talents.
I find them struggling to analyze their talents when they haven't bothered to complete the graphic.
I find them torturing themselves with the graphic because they haven't remembered seven events that gave them a sense of fun, adventure, excitement, or accomplishment.
In fact, I've actually had students claim that they've never done anything for fun, adventure, excitement, or accomplishment-as if returning to school isn't an accomplishment.
They have already decided that their lives are a waste, so they don't even try to remember.
They don't trust the process; consequently, they simply skip the process and complain when they can't do the assignment.
But just as inevitably, a few of my students painstakingly follow each step as explained to them and sail painlessly through the project.
Most worthwhile activities follow a process.
Learning, leading, growing, problem solving, brainstorming, remembering, planning, decision making, communicating, motivating, budgeting, and even creating all follow a process.
Whenever you find an activity difficult, you should try to identify the steps in that activity's process, so that you can practice the steps you've been missing.
The other day, one of my friends told me that he'd spent over two hours trying to get his wireless mouse working.
Finally, in frustration, he picked up the directions-and got his mouse working within three minutes.
Don't skip steps.
Process works for a reason.