Resilience in Adversity

Author’s note: Welcome to Edition 12. I write about learning how to deal with adversity and leveraging it for growth. Please lmk your thoughts about this essay. I also write a second newsletter with in-depth commentary on how new-age Indian businesses make money (Newsletter link here).

I detest adversity. I hate how it feels and how it makes everyone around me feel. It courses through my veins and exits in a foul temper, harsh words and miserable mood. Adversity is a gust of wind banging doors through your home on a Sunday morning. You want stillness but you sit with your head on a swivel as doors open and close with infrequent bangs. A hundred cups of caffeine litter your home but they only contain dregs of past warm liquids. They only offer bitter remains of brighter days.

Your ability to deal with adversity is a preview of your future life. Adversity can overwhelm everything and everyone we care about if we are not careful. You have to develop a strategy to deal with times when things do not go your way. Nothing lasts for long, the good or the adverse. It always stays for a little longer than you believe you can tolerate. Believe you can withstand it for 10 days, it will stay for 12. Believe you can survive 2 weeks, it stays for 3. Like with everything else, we underestimate what we are capable of and give greater grace to adversity.

On the contrary, escaping adversity is not an aspiration. Evading the slightest hint of mediocrity or failure is not grounds for success. The easier path comes with a lower ceiling. Any victory will be small-sized and diminished.

The risk reward continuum plays out with a new adversary in adversity. You have to fight through the ugly for an opportunity to change your life. Adversity drives outsized opportunities (not outcomes). It will push you to the brink and steel you in unknowable ways. Your ability to develop a formidable character will yield opportunity.

You get to compete for larger prizes if you can dare to fail at a larger level. This ruinous opportunity will make you or break you. It will not leave you in between twiddling your thumbs. Adversity is a perfect storm that will change everything for you, or against you.

You can embrace adversity as instructive without letting down your guard. Each blow is not final or fatal. It will push you off course but it cannot seize your progress. You may move in tiny increments but you will move forward if you take the adversary in your stride. As Chris Paul said, “Reps remove doubt”. And as you inch forward, you build conviction to take longer strides. This builds courage to propel you beyond steps that you can see.