Part 1 of 2
Let’s talk today about overachievers and their challenges. Not the challenges they face each day as they meet and exceed expectations and goals (they are overachievers, after all). But instead, I’m talking about the challenges that make these people into overachievers in the first place. Most overachievers have overcome significant hurdles—in their pasts.
Tough things have happened to many, if not most, of them, and these tough things made them who they are.
Lots of times, these tough things happened at a young, vulnerable age. Some examples that I’ve heard in my executive coaching from overachieving CEOs include: My dad died when I was nine years old. My parents got a divorce, and my dad moved 3,000 miles away and I only saw him two times a year. My mother was an alcoholic. My dad left my mother and married his secretary.
In Malcolm Gladwell’s 2013 book, “David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants,” he offers several examples of underdogs who beat the odds and ended up as overachievers. I invite you to listen to his “unheard story of David & Goliath” on a TEDTalk. A teaser: “Everything I thought I knew about that story,” Gladwell says, “turned out to be wrong.”
Me, too. Sometimes, armor is not what you need. We have a tendency to employ some sort of armor to contain unpleasantness or doubts. But sometimes armor keeps you from moving forward. Choose your tools wisely.
Namely, use disadvantages to your advantage.
Gladwell says that people with a learning disability have an advantage. (Yes, I know that sounds counterintuitive.) He writes: “Dyslexia—in the best of cases—forces you to develop skills that might otherwise have lain dormant.” He says that having a disability or a disadvantage of some sort, “… forces you to do things you might otherwise never have considered.”
I was working with a super-successful executive who told me part of his life’s story. When he was young, his dad, who owns his own business, went bankrupt. The family went from living in a beautiful, spacious home in a nice neighborhood to living in a small, not-so-nice apartment. What’s more, the family was a dysfunctional one. His sibling had drug and alcohol issues. His mom also began to drink heavily. And his dad was usually absent—even when he was home.
And yet this executive, who faced significant setbacks and obstacles at a very young and impressionable age, grew up to be an overachiever—both professionally and personally. He is an exemplary executive, husband, and father. He says his strong faith is one of the main reasons for his groundedness.
But I think part of the reason why he’s so successful—why he pushes himself so hard—is because of his earlier family setbacks. They showed him what he didn’t want and didn’t want to be. And he had enough confidence in himself to move past that. That confidence, I also believe, comes from having to rely upon himself at a young age. So, the challenges he faced actually turned out to be his motivating strength.
I should point out that this doesn’t always work out this way. We all know that.
Some people with past challenges—especially past traumas—overachieve out of fear. Fear of failure. Fear of letting others down. Fear of being seen as weak or incompetent. These people in particular often need to temper their overachieving tendencies and personality with practiced mindfulness. They need to be careful to not overdo it when overachieving.
In our next blog post, I’ll talk more about overcoming past difficulties in a way that is not overtaxing and anxiety-producing in order to create a successful and sustainable here and now.
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