Challenge Yourself

One of the things that created a sensation through social media, a few years back, is the Ice Bucket Challenge, which involves dumping a bucket of ice water on someone's head to promote awareness of the disease Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS).  Just when people across the globe were pouring tonnes of ice on their heads through the ice bucket challenge, a bunch of youngsters in Hyderabad city came out with an idea of Rice bucket challenge towards feeding the needy. 

Quiet Interesting! The trends of the modern world, in creating a hype even around a social awareness campaign makes it interesting and catches the public attention. This is the way, we can get the younger generation interested in something. Traditional methods don't seem to work.

The idea of challenge excites people. It triggers the adrenaline rush and people perform to their maximum potential. There are so many popular TV shows, based on the concept of challenging to do something extraordinary or daring to do something weird. There is a thrill and sense of accomplishment, attached to these types of events.

While these type of externally stimulated challenges are interesting, these could just be a fad and may not be long lasting. Whereas, if we need to bring about a sustainable positive change, we need to look into the possibility of stimulating internal challenges. This is something all of us can do. Let us say we need to discipline ourselves on certain areas, rather than holding on to it as just as a wishful thinking we can convert it as a challenge we give to ourselves. These types of internal challenges, when accomplished may not win the recognition or appreciation of the world around us, but it will sure be a morale booster to our own self esteem.

Challenges are not the big resolutions that we make on a New Year eve. They are just small targets we keep setting for ourselves day in and day out, and feel a sense of pride when we accomplish it. It is these small accomplishments that make us feel worthy of being able to achieve something bigger in life. Just for an example, here is a typical list of some of the challenges, I have given to myself.

• To wake up at 5:00am,  every morning no matter at what time I go to bed.

• To go for a 45 minute walk          as a part of my fitness regime.

• To send a “Thought for the  day” to my circle of friends every morning

• To write an article for my in-house magazine “PALMS PLUS” every month.

If I don’t accomplish any of these, nobody is going to question me, as to why I have not done it, but I take it as a sense of personal integrity. When I fail in any one of these, I fall before my own eyes. And it hurts.

I believe that by integrating such type of internal challenges in our life, we can make our life not only interesting, but also rewarding. The rewards are in the form of developing a healthy life style and inculcating some good habits that would last a life time.

Here is one challenge, I gave to myself quiet recently.  I asked myself, why not I share a quick review of the android apps I use on my mobile phone with my WhatsApp circle of friends.  I felt that it would be of use to many of my friends, who use an android phone. So, I decided to write a brief note of some of the apps, that I found useful and started sending it out as a WhatsApp message with a prefix “App of the day”, for the next 31 days at a stretch. It was not a pre-planned idea. It started just like that. No one asked me to do it. There was no compulsion. There was no obligation. There were no rewards for doing it, neither any punishments for not doing it. It was just a thought in my mind and I decided to put this little pressure on myself. The result of this challenge, I was able to create a new article titled “31 Useful Android Apps”.

When we challenge ourselves on something or other, it not only makes us more competent, but also helps us to become more confident. Challenge yourself and enjoy the rewards of your own challenges!

  D. Senthil Kannan,

  Managing Trustee, PALMS, Tuticorin.

  Author of "Transformational Thoughts" - A Journey of learning 

  Email: senthilkannand@gmail.com