What are desirable difficulties? Are all difficulties desirable?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Desirable difficulties are so-called disadvantages that can actually be strong advantages. They build resilience<\/a> and make you seek surprising strengths despite having the difficulties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We’ll cover three desirable difficulties — disability, tragedy, and having nothing — and look at why these difficulties may make you stronger than you would have been without them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n Consider these three \u201cdesirable difficulties\u201d: disability, tragedy, and having nothing. What makes these, or any difficulties, desirable?<\/p>\n\n\n\n An experiment involving the Cognitive Reflection Test (CRT) demonstrates the advantages of a desirable difficulty. The CRT is the shortest intelligence test in the world at three questions long. At Princeton, researchers first gave the test to students in clear, standard font and print size. Students scored an average of 1.9 correct answers out of three. The second time researchers gave the CRT to Princeton students, they printed the test in hard-to-read font that was 10% gray. The average score increased<\/em> from 1.9 correct answers to 2.45. Yes, CRT scores increased when researchers made the test more difficult<\/strong>. How can this be?<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is the power of desirable difficulties: They make life harder, but they allow you to get more out of life as you confront them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One desirable difficulty is disability (or deficiency). When we are deficient in a skill area that most people depend on for success, we will only succeed if we find a way to compensate for our deficiency<\/strong>. We may compensate so well that our skills are more impressive than if we didn\u2019t have the disability in the first place. Most of our learning can be roughly divided into two types:<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s not a given that someone with a deficiency in one area will automatically compensate for it by developing extraordinary talents in another area. But those that can do this are better off than they would be if they didn\u2019t have the deficiency, because compensation learning (gained through struggle) is more powerful than capitalization learning (which is relatively easy). The desirable difficulty of deficiency is only desirable if we compensate for it. A surprisingly high percentage (one study says \u2153) of successful entrepreneurs and business leaders are dyslexic. Are they successful in their careers despite their dyslexia or, perhaps, because of it? People with dyslexia often compensate by developing other skills, including memory, observation, and summarizing skills.<\/strong> For instance, David Boies is one of the most successful trial lawyers in the world. But he didn\u2019t learn to read until he was in 3rd grade, and even today, he reads slowly and poorly. Boies credits his dyslexia (undiagnosed when he was young) for his amazing abilities in memorization, listening, observing, and distilling key points. He had to get really good at all these skills to compensate for the fact that he couldn’t read well or quickly. For Boies, dyslexia turned out to be a desirable difficulty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Other people with dyslexia compensate in different ways. Movie producer Brian Grazer became skilled at the art of persuasion<\/strong>. Grazer\u2019s dyslexia caused him to struggle in all his high school and college classes (which are usually text-based). After he received a grade, he\u2019d go to the teacher and convince him or her to raise his grade by one letter. He says this worked 90% of the time. Grazer learned to negotiate out of necessity<\/strong>. This was good training for his eventual career as a movie producer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n A note on dyslexia and success: Many people with dyslexia never learn to effectively compensate for their inabilities. A high proportion of prison inmates have dyslexia. Only when we can learn from our difficulties and overcome the failures they produce do they benefit us. The second \u201cdesirable difficulty\u201d is trauma. Courage is not innate; it is something you have to earn. You earn it by surviving something you didn\u2019t think you could survive, or confronting a fear and realizing it\u2019s not as scary as you expected. Because it can result in courage, trauma actually leaves some people better off than they were before.<\/strong> How does this work?<\/p>\n\n\n\n We tend to believe that trauma affects everyone the same way, and that this effect is universally negative. There are actually 3 general effects of trauma<\/a><\/strong>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The third desirable difficulty is having nothing to lose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a fair world, everyone could follow the conventional rules of the game and win. In the world we have, perpetual underdogs occasionally need to break the rules to succeed. To do so, they need to be \u201cdisagreeable\u201d in the sense that they can\u2019t care what others think. If you have an abundance of wealth, status, and material goods, you risk all of it when you play by your own rules rather than society\u2019s.<\/strong> You\u2019re constrained. You have everything to lose. But if you have very little and you\u2019ve been neglected (or worse) by society, you don\u2019t have anything to lose by bucking tradition and going your own way.<\/strong> This gives you freedom that those with more to lose don\u2019t have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When the conventional way doesn\u2019t work, try something unconventional. For instance, the leaders of the American Civil Rights Movement<\/a> had to play by their own rules with Project C<\/a> because society\u2019s didn\u2019t work for them. Martin Luther King, Jr., and many Civil Rights activists, came from a community that had been enslaved and oppressed for hundreds of years. Being an underdog community for centuries was a clear disadvantage to its members. But it also taught them how to operate as underdogs and win. African Americans were not respected by the societies they sought to transform. They couldn\u2019t lose a respect they never had. This made them freer in their strategies than their opponents.<\/strong> Walker devised a plan for Birmingham called Project C <\/strong>(\u201cC\u201d for confrontation). The success of Walker\u2019s plan depended on getting Bull Connor to fight back. The hope was that if they could get Connor to blatantly mistreat protesters, the news coverage would generate sympathy<\/strong> for the movement across the nation and in the government. Connor didn\u2019t want King\u2019s marchers to cross into \u201cwhite\u201d Birmingham, and he would do anything in his power to keep them from doing it. Walker and King knew this about Connor. They also knew that Connor was itching for a fight. Walker\u2019s plan was classic Brer Rabbit\u2014figuring out what the enemy wanted more than anything and then using that knowledge to bait him. Walker used the desirable difficulty of having nothing to lose to his advantage. He used many strategies that a community with more to lose wouldn’t have dared use: He organized marches with imaginary protesters and made Conner look bad by baiting him and getting him to jail children and turn the hoses and dogs on protesters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One photographer snapped a picture of a dog lunging at a fifteen-year-old boy. It was a picture that turned the tide of the movement. Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 a year later. How did they come up with these \u201ctricks\u201d?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Perhaps morality is just a name for the rules that Goliaths play by. <\/strong>Walker didn\u2019t have any other options. The conventional, \u201cmoral\u201d ways were not effective against the white giant and his racism. If the world isn\u2019t fair, are you required to play fair?<\/strong> Walker said later that he had no choice when he resorted to using children in his marches. He pointed out that Bull Connor was not moral, and therefore couldn\u2019t be fought using \u201cmoral\u201d methods. Underdogs are not naturally tricky. They become tricky out of necessity<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These examples show how disadvantages can become desirable difficulties if you’re able to capitalize on them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What are desirable difficulties? Are all difficulties desirable? Desirable difficulties are so-called disadvantages that can actually be strong advantages. They build resilience and make you seek surprising strengths despite having the difficulties. We’ll cover three desirable difficulties — disability, tragedy, and having nothing — and look at why these difficulties may make you stronger than you would have been without them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":1620,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[42,9,43,24],"tags":[47],"class_list":["post-1702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-motivation","category-psychology","category-self-improvement","category-society","tag-david-and-goliath","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"\nDesirable Difficulties<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\nDesirable Difficulty #1\u2014Disability<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\nCapitalization Learning versus Compensation Learning<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\nDyslexia: For Some, a Desirable Difficulty<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\nDesirable Difficulty #2\u2014Trauma<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\nTrauma Strengthens Some People and Weakens Others<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Desirable Difficulty #3\u2014Having Nothing (and Nothing to Lose)<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe American Civil Rights Movement and Desirable Difficulty<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n