Ep. 184 Adversity– Bitter, Broken, or Better

These motivational moments and insights from Joe Pici will inspire you to achieve greater success as you keep moving forward.

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Get ready for an unfair advantage over your competition. This is the sales edge podcast. Were globally recognized sales expert and trainer Joe Pici helps you sharpen your skills for booking more appointments and closing more deals. And now here’s your host Joe Pici.
Joe Pici (JP):
Hey team, this is Joe Pici and this is the podcast sales edge and thank you so much. I am your host and thank you so much for our Growth. We’re excited about what we’re seeing happening around the globe. But today we wanted to first we want to thank our sponsors, which is Pici and Pici, which is a speaking, coaching, training, consulting firm. Which is specializing in helping our clients recapture lost revenue, momentum, and just get back on track and go after that money that’s out there get in front of your target market. The second thing is our SMV, sell more virtually, which is our membership platform. Where every Thursday night I’m out there live doing coaching or training to a group of members alt and we want more and more members, of course. And also there’s downloads, there’s interviews. There’s so much content on that and will be more to come about that. And so we’re moving forward. We want you to feel free to call me at 407 947 2590 reach out anytime and for a cup of joe.
Or Joe@piciandpici.com where you can send me an e-mail. Suggestions, agreements, disagreements, got thick skin here at at the sales edged podcast and so we can handle it. And so we’re going to move forward. And I’ve got a topic today. It’s probably apropos for what’s gone on adversity bitter broken or better. Well, let me take you back to 1988 seems like yesterday, but 1988. I’m sitting in an auditorium, thousands and thousands of people I’ve got my notepad out. There is a international national just spokesman and he’s a powerhouse of a speaker. And he is speaking on the very topic of adversity. Will it make you bitter or better? I take out my notebook and I’m going to scratch off a ton of notes here. You know, he talked about challenges. He talked about obstacles. He talked about why bad things happen to good people. Can you relate? He laid out a complete set of adversities that we might go through in our lifetime. He then spoke about the perspective we should have in dealing with adversity. Today I’m going to be dealing with the perspective of adversity and how we could face adversity and come out of it bitter, broken, or better. So what is it adversity?
When you look at what adversity, is its trouble, it’s difficult situations. It’s distress. It’s disaster. It’s suffering. It’s affliction, sorrow, loss, misery, tribulation, setback, crisis, catastrophe, tragedy, hard times. I could go on. Does that not sound like 2020? I mean doesn’t it sound like how many of us have gone through all of these, some of these? How many of us are still faced with some of these challenges? You know, it’s I truly believe no matter who you are, where you come from, your nationality, your background, you know, I don’t care what it is. Adversity is going to find you. It’s not a matter of if you’re going to go through it adversity. It’s just a matter of when. You know the the thing about adversity, it’s tenacious. It’s long reaching, and no one can escape it. And I look around, I looked at you know, Dawn and I and I look at the adversity we have had in our life. I look at the adversity we still have in our life. I look at our clients. I look at some of their adversity. I look at some of our family the adversity. I look at our friends, the adversity. I haven’t seen anyone that hasn’t been faced with some type of adversity. So, how do we respond? How are we going to respond? Are we going to get bitter? Are we going to allow ourselves to be broken? Or will we get better?
You know Albert Einstein once said “adversity introduces a man to himself”. When adversity comes don’t we find out who we really are. Adversity trials really reveal our character. Now I’m not saying you can’t develop character, because you can. When when adversity strikes you don’t have time to build character. Your character is there and it becomes revealed? Will you be bitter? When you’re bitter, some of the characteristics of being bitter, can be anger, hurt, resentful, we tend to blame others. We might not accept responsibility. There’s always a reason. Bitterness can be long-lasting.
Bitterness can definitely get in the way of future success. Because when you’re bitter you’re looking backwards. You know it when you’re looking backwards you struggle to move forward. Or are we going to be broken? Broken is when we given up hope. Broken is when we are defeated. We are beaten. We’re unable to get up. That’s when you see that boxer that goes down that doesn’t get up. That’s when you see people quit striving quit. And so let’s quit quitting. A broken person really struggles to recapture the enthusiasm, the focus. Or will you be better? Better is when you’ll learn from the adversity. When you’re stronger, when you’re experienced. You’ve been tried by fire. You know, nobody wants to go through adversity. No one. But if you choose to become better, not bitter or broken, we are all better for it on the other side. You see the grass is the deepest and the greenness in the valley. You learn the most when you’re going through adversity. I know I have. You know, very rarely do you learn anything when you’re on top of the mountain. So many people I remember, a lady that we were doing businesses business with one time actually said to us I’ve arrived. That’s a dangerous place to be.
And so which one do you choose? Do you choose to be bitter? Many years ago I remember getting fired. And it was a devastating firing. It was it was an ugly firing. It was a firing that cost us all, the whole coaching staff our careers money time. It was devastating and some chose to move on. But I remember seeing one of the people ten years later and he will Still talking about the day we got fired. He was bitter. He was slightly broken. And he said this to me, why doesn’t this still bother you?
Because I said because I’ve worked to get better. I’m working to get better and I’m working to learn the lessons that life wants to teach you. So the choice is yours. I’m going to give you some perspectives. Adversity causes some men to break and others to break records. Let me say again, adversity tends to make some people break and some to break records. Adversity has the effect of drawing out strengthen quality of men and women that would have lain dormant in their absence. So sometimes adversity causes you to take a dead or unachieved ability and make it alive. You know, it’s often it’s often said in athletics, often more is learned from defeats and victories. You know, and nobody wants to lose. But I don’t know if you lose or you learn. And so the same is true in life. When times are good we’re almost running our lives on automatic pilot. We can go about our business without too much difficulty. Everything is you know, okay, you know, we we maybe get up ten minutes later. It’s okay. Things are okay. When we are faced with adversity, this is what defines us. How you react to adversity defines who we are.
And make sure you know, this someone is always watching. I don’t care if it’s your grandchildren, your children, your friends, your family, your employees, your partner’s, your clients. People watch to see how we deal with adversity. You have two choices on how you can deal with adversity. You can either view it as an obstacle or impediment that cannot be shifted. Or you can view it as an opportunity, a chance to learn and grow.
You know what? I hate to say this, you know, it’s going to sound like Oh God, Joe, but pain is a part of life. We used to say to our football players, no pain no gain. And people would go but that’s that. Isn’t that true? As uncomfortable as it is to reject it, it would be to reject life itself. We have to learn to accept adversity as a part of life. You know, we all know you look you’re either going into adversity, you’re in adversity, you’re coming out of adversity.
You know before this podcast is over, somebody who’s listening to this podcast is going to experience something to do with adversity. That’s just the way it is.
And so are you and no one is immune. I wish I could say. Well, you know, this only happens to that person. No one is immune. You know, I mean, we’re all going to face it. But are we going to use it to our advantage or a disadvantage? You know, I’ve seen very, very, very, very, very wealthy people that from the outside looking at them, they have no challenges. They have no adversity, but they really do. But also, I think it’s important that we don’t have to spill our adversity to everybody. We don’t have to whine. We don’t have to spew our bitterness, our brokenness. Are we going to be a beacon of light or we going to be a whiner? Sorry was that too strong? It’s a decision you have to make yourself. To use adversity as your advantage. If you use adversity correctly, you can become a different person. You know, I Think about the people I’ve seen that have used adversity as a springboard, to the next thing. I watch those people, but something happens inside of a person that uses adversity as a catapult, as a catalyst. Something inside of them grows. You know, we talked towards self esteem, self worth, whatever you want to call it. The day you face adversity and you fight through it, you build up an internal muscle. So how can this adversity helped me to become wiser? How can this adversity help me to make a better decision? You want to consider, is this adversity helping me to change, or adjust my my direction? It’s all an approach. It’s all an outlook. Nothing is new under the Sun. You know in in millions and millions and millions of years. We’ve all known this. People face adversity
So how we going to deal with it? You know some of the things I would say that you can do and this is just some of the things you can do. I think we can surround ourselves with positive solution-minded people. I mean, I’m going to say something. Please don’t take this wrong. I limit the amount of time that I’m going to spend with bitter or broken people.
It’s not that I don’t want to be an encouragement to them, I do. But do they want a solution? Some people want to wallow in self-pity, some people want to wallow in their bitterness. Some people want to wallow in their brokenness and that’s their choice. There’s nothing wrong with that. But my advice to you is, limit the amount of time you spend there, because it can affect your attitude. It can affect the way you know, I believe there’s times when people call me up and they say are you always upbeat?
Doesn’t what’s going on affect you at all, don’t you care? A matter of caring. It’s a matter of are we going to be bitter? Are we going to are we going to be broken, or we going to work to get better? Something else. Be careful of what you’re reading and watching and taking in. It’s going to even make you more bitter and more broken. You want to put you want put uplifting stuff in, there was a year in my life. And that was particularly worse than others. And the guy said to me why don’t you just read 12 biographies of people that achieved above average success. And so I did. And what I found out was the people who achieved above average success, went through the most adversity? No, Dawn and I don’t watch a lot of television, but she found a series on the men and women who built American Business. And the common denominator for these Giants, The Carnegie’s, The Fords, The Rockefellers. I don’t know what he’s agree with the way they did things, but I will tell you this the common denominator to their success was how they dealt with adversity.
Invest in yourself. Invest in your skill development. Invest in personal growth and development. Always be working to get better. Never feel like we’ve arrived, always take the next step for growth and develop. Always know what you’re focused on. Always have the clarity of mind of where are we going? You know when February came of last year and the wheels came off and and money was lost. All Dawn and I said to each other was here we go again. We have a way to do this. Let’s look at the solution. Let’s find a way. Let’s get better. Let’s learn more. Let’s pursue our dream. It doesn’t make us special.
What it makes us is that we decided to become better not bitter or broken.
Believe in who you are. Success is to be measured. Not so much by the position that one has reached in life. But the obstacles in which they’ve overcome. Let me say that again, success is to be measured not so much in a position that one has reached in light but by the obstacles, which has been overcome.

Let me take you back to that day that I was taking notes and and I had a book and I slipped this man. He had 15 ways you could overcome adversity and I slipped it into a book.
We started going to the season. Everyone’s wide looked at it close the book and we finished the season ranked number four in the nation. We were on the road and found out we were all fired. And the funny thing, it’s not funny. But the thing about it is, I’m sitting in a hotel room and I’m interviewing. I’m looking for a job to take care of my family. I’m looking for a job in the coaching industry. I’m driving, I’m flying, and I’m sitting in a hotel room and and I had that book with me and out of that book slid these principles of overcoming adversity.
And they were right there. Let’s not fall into that trap. You know brokenness and bitterness will cost you so much time. But being better is the solution. I’m going to be dealing with some of the keys that you can execute in overcoming adversity in the future.
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