Solution Thinking: Why Some People Stay Stuck While Others Move Forward him

Today’s conversation is about the difference between problem thinking and solution thinking.

Far too often, we become experts on our problems and beginners at finding solutions. We know when we’re struggling financially. We know when we’re stressed, unhappy, or stuck. The question is: why do some people stay in the same place while others continue to move forward?

In this episode of Prayers & Blessings: The Podcast, Mark Tyson discusses the importance of shifting your mindset from focusing on the problem to actively pursuing the solution.

Topics include:

• Why some people stay stuck while others move forward.
• How we allow problems to take up too much space in our minds.
• The difference between identifying a problem and solving it.
• The habits and sacrifices required to create change.
• Four questions that can help you become more solution-oriented:
   
  • What exactly is the problem?
•  
  • What part of this can I control?
•  
  • Who has already solved this problem?
•  
  • What action can I take today?
•  

Remember:

Problems are supposed to be visitors, not permanent residents.

The problem deserves your attention, but the solution deserves your energy.

Prayers & Blessings: The Podcast

Faith • Flavor • Focus feed the soul.

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“Discipline obtains excellence. Stay faithful. Stay focused. Stay developing.”  

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

What's up with the what's ups? Welcome back to another episode of Prayers and Blessings the Podcast. The faith, flavor, and focus feeds the soul. I'm your host, Mark Tyson. And before we get started, let's open the doors with prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you for another day, another opportunity to speak to someone, another opportunity to say something uplifting, motivational, and inspirational. May the words today fall on someone's heart, give them the courage they need to push the envelope forward. May you give them the courage to step in that mirror and tell themselves that they're tired of waiting and they're going to start today of changing their life and their old habits and their old ways and becoming a new person, the person that you have created them to be. Thank you. Amen. Today's episode is about solution thinking. If you have been enjoying Prayers and Blessings, the podcast, know that you can find me on Spotify, YouTube for the long content, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram for the shorts, motivation, words of the day. Just giving you inspiration and pushing you forward. Each and every day that I push the record button, it's me, giving you me. It's giving me, giving you prayers and blessings in real life, real time, real effort, real energy. Because not only have I took the steps to change my life and move in a different perspective and see things from a different perspective and to move in a different way. I want to help someone else out there move in a different way, see things from a different perspective. God has blessed me to show me what my purpose is, and my purpose is to help someone else. The reason why I've been through so many trials and tribulations and got and overcome it so that I can relate, so that we can relate to one another. This is where we connect and understand. Today I want to speak about solution. Solution thinking. Because we all have problems, and we all zoom in on our problems. We focus on our problems so much that it weighs us down, it stresses us out, it frustrates us. We linger on our problems so long. And it's not that we don't know what the problem is, we know what the problem is. We do not search for the solution. It's not always financial. Things go on with us mentally and frustrate us. And we allow it to live in our brain. Your problem should not live in your brain. It should be a visitor. Come, hello, and leave. Once you honestly understand what the problem is, you have to start working towards a solution. You can't sit there and stare at the wall over and over and over again and don't take the time out to search for the door and wonder why you're stuck. Some of us have problems where as though we're not happy because we are not doing what it takes to make us happy. We're not financially where we're at. We think that we should be further off in life. We feel like we should have more. Because we are aware of the problem. We are honestly, we honestly understand that the problem is we want better for ourselves. We have dissected the problem down till it's minuscule, but there's no action on the solution. Solution thinking comes in where you're taking the time out to understand, okay, this is my problem right here. My problem is I don't like where I work, or I don't like how much money they're giving me. And then we beat ourselves up. But at what time do you say to yourself, maybe I should start looking for something different? What is it that I need to do to protect my happiness? Why am I letting this problem have a full address in my brain? Success leaves clues. And the only way that you're gonna find these clues is you have to go and search for them. Let's say you want to do real estate, properties. You have to research that, you have to dig into that, you have to become one with that. You can't say, I wish I had this or I don't have these things for XYZ reasons. That's you letting the problem live in your head. You can't sit down and wait for someone else to make your problems go away. You have to be part of the solution. There comes a time where it can be money, it can be fear, disappointment, heartbreak, and like I said before, feeling of that feelings inside like you should be further in life. These are all problems. These are all the problems. And then sometimes we look at problems like this. We wonder how someone else is getting over their problems either quicker than us or they're handling their problems better. It's all action. It's all your train of thought. You can't sit in your problem and soak in your problem and want things to become better. You can't stare and focus and drain yourself out looking at this wall and don't try the door and don't even begin to search for the door. Some people are willing to sacrifice to find a solution to their problem. What are you willing to sacrifice to find a solution to your problem? You want something out of life, but you're not willing to sacrifice the time on your social media. Now, you can't, you can, but I'm not saying it's right. What I'm gonna say is you can't look at someone else and see how they're progressing and they be on social media all day. So you think that you could be on social media all day and still progress. You don't operate the way they operate. And you are not happy with where you are for totally different reasons than they're not happy where they are. You're not using your cell phone for beneficial reasons. You can't benefit yourself if you just scrolling on your social media all day looking at the other people's life. You're in another world. You're not even you're not even living in real time. You're not even you're not even in your residence. You've been home all day, but how long have you actually been in your residence? You've been on the couch, but how long have you really honestly enjoyed the relaxation of sitting there? You have not given your mind a rest from the moment that you can't, the moment you turn the car off and you sit down, you put your face in the phone, but that phone, there's there's nothing that you're looking at that's beneficial to you. So what it's doing is it's it's nourishing the problem and making you forget about the problem, but the minute that you stop looking at your phone, there's the problem again. Because you're not looking for the solution, you're not solution thinking. Nothing about you is solution based. You have to be solution based, you have to be solution-oriented. Because, like I said before, you already are aware of your problem. May it be uh obesity, you don't like that you have gained so much weight. You see what I'm saying? But you still are putting certain things in your body that's not helping. You're still ignoring it, but you're not happy with where you're at. You're not happy with the job you're at, but you're not doing anything to push the needle forward to change your trajectory. You are well aware of your problem. And like I said, it's not something that's necessarily leads to finances. It's not something that necessarily leads to finances. The only thing that right now can help you with the way that you're thinking and your and your problem is solution thinking. I can't say that enough. You have to be solution based. Now, I'm not saying this. I'm not saying that you should ignore your problem once you identify with the problem, right? Do not ignore the problem once you identify with the problem. The problem must get your attention. You have to give the problem some attention, but the solution a hundred percent must receive your energy. You got to give the solution all your energy. And me personally, I always I only I always teach and I speak from personal experiences, right? Because that's how we connect. That's the only way that I can honestly say that you can understand where I'm coming from if I speak from things that I honestly have been through, things that's worked for me, things that I adhere to. Drinking was something that was my problem. It wasn't nobody else's problem but mine. It kept me sleeping all day. It kept me weary, it made me sleep in the car, it got me into accidents. It was the problem. I understood what my problem was. So then it became part. What is your solution? You whining and crying about if you don't like the way you feel when you drink. You don't like the fact that this alcohol has control over you. Okay. Now, I'm not gonna ignore it because if I ignore it and don't give the problem the proper attention, I'll keep drinking and drinking and drinking and drinking and drinking. So now I must become solution-based. I have to start thinking of what is your solution? What is my solution to stop drinking? Number one, I pray on it. Right? That's the first thing. I say, my solution to me, stop drinking, I'm gonna pray. I'm gonna pray and I'm gonna pray and I'm gonna pray and I'm gonna pray and I'm gonna pray. Number two is if you don't like something and you don't like the way things make you feel, stop picking it up. See, some people pick it up because they enjoy it. But that wasn't my problem. I wasn't, I wasn't, it wasn't, it wasn't that I didn't like the way I felt, so I feel like my solution to my problem was stop picking this up. The stove is hot, and every time you touch it, you like the color or the light. Oh, that color looks nice. But every time you touch it, it burns you, and you don't like the blisters on your hand. Stop touching it. We're gonna get solution. We're getting solution based right now. I don't like the results that it's giving me. I don't like the results. I don't like to have to, I don't like, I don't have to be a grown man and I'm sneaking and drinking for my wife. I got sleeping downstairs because I don't want his, I don't want to go upstairs because she can smell alcohol on me. Okay, that's a problem. I'm under I identify with the problem. I'm letting the problem live in my head for months and months and months and months and months for a year, but I've never come up with a solution. Okay, Mark, let's get to what's gonna be your solution. The solution is simply you don't like it, you're gonna have to stop it. You try drinking a little bit, you try drinking one, you try drinking half one, that's not working. I went to an AA, I sat down, I told them what was on my mind, I cried my heart out, I came up out of there, I haven't picked up a drink since, due to the fact that, okay, the solution is you want something else out of life, you want some other things. This is slowing you down, and you feel better when you don't. So the solution is you. You are the solution. The only solution I could see in that in that equation was me. Nobody was making me do it. I wasn't nobody putting no gun in my head. I wasn't nobody was controlling me with a remote control. I had to tell myself, I'm stronger than this. There's no way that I'm gonna sit here and let this thing, how much this cost? $8.99 for six-pack. You're gonna let $8.99 control you, make you look old in the face? What's the solution? The solution is I like being happy. I like not touching it. So therefore, we're not gonna touch it. We're not even gonna indulge in it, we're not gonna put ourselves in those spaces. We're not gonna, we, we're gonna, we're gonna do everything in our power. If you have to change, you have to reinvent yourself. I had to reinvent myself. I started coming up with solutions because I was already aware of the problem. I don't have no problem, I don't have, I don't even have a problem telling no one that I had a drinking problem at a point at a point in time. I don't have no problem, I don't have a problem with telling anybody that I was I was sober, drink alcohol free for four and a half years. Then I went back and started drinking for two years. I don't have no problem telling them that. You know why? Because it's me. I had to deal with that. I had to live with that, I had to recover from that. It does, it's no longer living in my head. I'm not ashamed of none of that. I'm actually proud that I can say I fought it and I beat it. And each and every day that I don't drink nothing, I feel good about that. True indeed. Some days I actually get, I'll be like, yo, it would be nice to have a beer, but I know better. I know better. And I'm growing, and I can I could come up with 50,000 different reasons why I should be able to go drink, but I know better because no one, like I said before, I don't like the way it makes me feel. That ain't me, that ain't who I am. So we all solution, I'm finding solutions, and then I take this, I find more reasons to make my solutions work for me. When you winners win, right? And if you in any situation in your life that you want to win, you gotta do what you gotta do to win. You gotta you don't like the job you've been in, I don't care how long you've been there. You just say, I've been here five years, I don't want to stop, I've been here 10 years, I don't want to just waste all that. So you're gonna say, you're gonna tell me that the time that you've been there is more important than your happiness. You're miserable, you don't like it. Go somewhere else. Because I guarantee you this, if they get tired of you, they're gonna let you go. Then what? That time that's still counted. Be happy with you. Find a solution. Any problem that you have, you have to stop living in it. We're not problem thinking, we're solution thinking. We're putting a base, we're putting a floor to the bottom of this. Because right now, if you're soaking and you're living in your problem, there's no floor to the bottom. It's just keep falling and falling and falling and falling and falling. All right, let's start building the floor to the bottom and say, all right, I'm planting my feet right here, and the buck stops here. This is where it stops at. It stops right here and it starts with me. Reinvent yourself. Become, be, be, be, become that person, right, that you always said you wanted to be. If you're a person, I don't want to keep harboring on the and beating on the obesity thing, but it's it's right here at the tip of my brain. But if you're a person, right, that say that I'm overweight and you keep saying to yourself, I wish I could lose weight, or I wish I could have 10, 15 pounds, or why don't you just do what it just do it? So you can be happy with yourself, happy with the person you see. So you could honestly see what it feels like to give yourself a chance at being what you want to do. Being who you want to be. Be the person that God has created you to be. Because I know God ain't created you to be no whiner, complaining, no problem, uh, no, no problem child, a person who's who's not resilient. You have to understand that only when you do things to when you become solution-based, right? Your kids become solution-based. See, it ain't all about you. It ain't all about us. We are a product of the environment, right? It's either we're gonna go up or we're gonna go down. It's either you winning or you losing. It really is there really is no in-between. When you win it and you peaceful, when you peaceful, you when you are at peace with yourself and problems are not uh living in your head, your problems ain't supposed to have no address right here. That's peace. That's winning. What problem have you or did you let live in your head? What problem have you allowed to live in your head? You know when I pause right there, that's that's that, that's the one that gives you an opportunity to think. That's that, that's the one that gives you to say, you know what? I've been letting this problem live in my head forever. This heartbreak. My heart has been broken over this girl for 10 years now, five years now. She done moved on with her life. My heart has been broken over this guy for the last two, three months. He done moved on with his life. Now become a student. Become a student of solution. Become a student of solution. And the way that you become a student of solution, you start solving problems. You have to start solving the problems. Because at the end of the day, in the beginning of the day, in the middle of the day, if it's a problem that's in your life and you letting it linger and you letting Letting it ride and you letting it wear you down and you letting it harm you and you letting it cause you damage to your heart and your brain and your mental and you and it ain't sitting right with you. You had to become a student of solution. It's up to you to fix it. It's up to you to say to yourself, How long has this been going on? How long would I allow it to go on? Problems fester. A problem in your life that you're not happy with will fester inside of you for a long period of time. If you let it. And then you'd be wondering why you're walking around angry and mean and evil. And other people can see that in you. Because it's something it's something inside of you that's not sitting well. And you dwell on it each and every day, but you don't even figure out how to fix it. You have to become a solution thinker.

SPEAKER_01 22:59

I only listen to diesel amen. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:06

Let me tell you how simple it is, right?

SPEAKER_01 23:08

This ain't about wins or loss.

SPEAKER_00 23:10

It's just this simple.

SPEAKER_01 23:12

Material gains. It's that luxury motivation.

SPEAKER_00 23:16

The car is dirty.

SPEAKER_01 23:19

I know things can get heavy. Obstacles are only one card.

SPEAKER_00 26:14

I just dumped that didn't get it. Now once I committed to it, I couldn't stop. Became part of it. It's life. Especially when it's pointing you in the right direction, you're doing some things that's beneficial not only for you, but for someone else. Once you become solution-based and solution-oriented, and you start having way you start changing the way you think and the way you look at things, and you have solution-based thinking, you can't stop. It becomes a part of you. Because you refuse to let problems weigh you down. You're going to refuse to ever have allow problems to have a living room, a couch, and a kitchen, and a bathroom in your head. Because you're going to enjoy your peace. You're going to enjoy what it feels like to be peaceful. You're going to enjoy what it feels like to have a clear mind, a clear conscience that you're doing something about it. You're going to enjoy you. You are going to enjoy yourself. You're going to be like, you know what? I don't let nothing stress me out no more. It's going to be a pee, it's going to be a part of your part of your mind, your body, and soul. It's going to be like, you know what? I need some more money. Let me put something together. Let me figure something out. That's what you're going to be saying. Let me figure something out. Not let me, not let me sit around and be upset with myself. Not let it linger. Not let it stress me. A lot of us be just stressed. We be stressed about nothing. We be stressed about things that we never even took some time to try to try to figure it out. We never even took the opportunity to say, you know what? I got this. Let me handle this right quick. We'd rather let it run rampant in our brain. Or we'll point the finger at somebody else and say they're the they're the blame for it. It's their fault. Things are the way it is in my life. If he would do this, the things would be different. Or if she would do that, or it's all their fault. There's some things that happened in my life that I had to honestly remove myself from because that was the only solution. I had to I had to remove myself from people in my life because that was the only solution. It was no more trying to figure it out. It was no more sitting down talking, let me see what's on my mind, I'm gonna get this on my chest. Or or I'll take I'll take on the I'll take on the I'll take it on because I'm the man. I'll take the I'll take the blame. Go ahead, give it to me. Yeah, it's my fault. You know what I'm saying? No. Because then you walking around with that asking yourself, why I always gotta be the big person? Why I always gotta be the person that gotta suck that one up? Why I always gotta be the one. No, now you that's another, you just created another problem. You honestly created another problem. You thought the solution was be the man of it, back away, be accountable for somebody else doing, so that they could feel better. But then you walk around feeling like you you always gotta. So the solution was how about you remove yourself from the equation so that you never come up in the story no more. Now you can't even use my name and say I did anything or was a part of anything that was going on. There was a problem, came with a solution. You happy with the solution, you move forward, you live good, you enjoy your peace. But see, there is some people who just love a good problem. And that's the honest truth. There's some people out there who just have who just got a knack for problems. They want to instigate, they want to be a part of. Because they never been solution-based. They never they never had to deal with, they never even thought about being a part of solution thinking. It's a beautiful thing when you honestly put forth put forth effort and changing your way of thinking. When you honestly put forth effort of watching some things or listening to some things that's going in the direction that you want to go, and you can get something from it and hold on to it and use it as fuel and ammunition to push your life forward is beautiful. Now, depending on who you are, you might think that you're being selfish because you're thinking about yourself and you're moving the needle forward for your happiness. But if you don't, then you're giving yourself reasons to let problems live in your head. You're giving yourself reasons to be annoyed. I think you should give solution thinking and problem solving. Just one shot for yourself. No matter what it is, if you're fear or something, if you feel like I can't, I keep spending money. Do you notice there's there's people who will actually identify with that problem and say, I have a bad habit with spending money. I buy too many sneakers, or I buy too many shirts, or I buy too many hats, I buy too many of this. They identify with the problem. They know they want a bigger home, a better car, but they refuse. They're ready to sit with the excuse. I'm just addicted to it. Oh well, I gotta have it. But then after they have all these things that they're spending their money on, they'll go in the house and be mad that they don't have the things that they really, really need. Or the bigger picture that's putting a bigger smile on their face, just making them more comfortable, just pushing their envelope forward, just pushing their needle forward. There's people out there who actually are aware of the problem in their life that's keeping them in a rut. But they don't want to act on a solution. They don't have to be you. If you're listening to this right now and you have a problem in your life, no matter be girlfriend, your kid, you who with uh finances, vehicle, stop dwelling on the problem and start being what is gonna be the solution to this? How am I gonna fix this? Don't live in it. Don't let the problem live in your brain. This episode was brought to you from me because I hear I hear, I have heard for the last week a lot of people, you know, in different instances talk about their problems. And I sit there and I just listen. And at the end of a lot of their problems, they say their problems, then they say, and I don't know what I'm gonna do. They tell a problem, and then at the end of the problem, they say, and I don't know what I'm gonna do. You know why you don't know what you're gonna do? Because you ain't even thought that far. It's like, it's like reading a sentence, right? It's like you're about to read a book. You just read the first line, and then you read the first line, you go back to the first line again. And read the first line, and you go back to the first line again. Read the first line and go back to the first line again. You never even read down to the, you never keep going. So you read the problem, and then you read the problem over, and then you read the problem over, and then you read the problem over. Why do you keep reading the problem? We understand what the problem is. Keep reading further down, it's gonna tell you how to solve it. Let's say if you know better, you do better. I just gave you some information to help you do better. Okay, you know what your problem is. Now you have to be solution thinking. You have to have, you have to have a put a say, you know what, I'm gonna start thinking about solutions to my problems. Now, when you think about the solutions to your problems, you must act on it. I said I had a drinking problem. I said it was holding me back. I was sleeping all day. I was only getting up to go get money, come back, get in the bed, go back to sleep, but then I drink a bottle all day. And it wasn't helping me nothing. So what I said was, okay, what's gonna be the solution to you stop drinking? I'm gonna start picking it up. How you gonna start picking it up? I'm gonna start picking it up one day at a time. All right, the mind I ain't drinking. Damn, babe, I went three days. Damn, babe, I went four days. But you know what? I have a drink all week and it actually feels good. God, can you please help me keep this taste out of my mouth, Lord Jesus? God, I've been doing good. I've been four days without drinking. Thank you for removing this taste from my mouth. Without you, I don't know what I would do. Amen. Two months, no drinking. Now, it's like I don't even think about it no more. It's not even, it's not even a an issue. I thought I needed to go to AA. That was part of my solution. I went. Okay. I had to realize, boy, you did it for four years before without no AA. You, it's you. Cool, I'm the solution to my problem. It was that simple for me. Might not be simple for you. You might have to do a little bit more. But you don't want to have to keep going through trials and tribulations and keep bumping your head till you figure it out. But I do want to say this. Every problem has a solution. Think about it. What am I going through? And what am I gonna do to fix it? There's a hole in this roof in here, and it's leaking. And I can keep putting buckets down in. You know what I'm saying? And spending this money over here on God knows what. Or I could take this money and be like, yo, can somebody come fix this roof right here? Or I can sit there and complain, eh, this roof is leaking. Look at this roof. It just keeps leaking in here. I'm sick of this house. No, you're sick of this house because you're looking at the problem, but you ain't trying to figure it out. The roof and the leak ain't the problem. That's the person that's sitting there letting it leak. I feel good about this episode today. I honestly feel good. You know what I'm gonna- I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna start doing interviews and sit down and start talking to some people so that I can honestly get some feedback on how they feel about this topics and the subjects, the subject matters. If you have something you want to talk about on Prayers and Blessings the podcast, you can find me on TikTok, Prayers and Blessings, Instagram, prayers and blessings, Facebook, Mark Tyson. DM me. Mark, I would love to come on your podcast and sit down and talk. But when we come to talk, I don't want to talk about nothing other than growth and winning and changing people's trajectory in life and perspective and helping them push forward. Prayers and blessings to podcast is about helping people push forward, helping them become the person that God has created them to be, helping them find a purpose, helping them get over the hump, helping them find solutions, helping them become solution based, helping them put a floor to the bottom so they can have some strong foundation to stand on. If you're interested in sitting down and talking with Mr. Prayers and Blessings, aka Mr. What's Up with the WhatsApps? Mr. Prayers and Blessings. Pray for stronger shoulders. You can DM me. I got a fan page right here. You can go to my fan page and type it in. Mark, I would love to come sit down and talk to you. If you got some questions about me, my lifestyle, how I live, what did it take for me to honestly want to change my life and turn my life around? What is your, what do you need? What do you want? I would love to sit down and talk with anybody that's gonna be talking about something positive. I don't want to get on here and talk about nobody. Uh no stars and their latest cars and their houses, and guess who got a million dollars and guess who? A billionaire, and none of that. Because that ain't gonna help me, it ain't gonna help the people around me elevate. I'm very down-to-earth, I'm very open-minded, and I'm not always right. I am always willing to suck up some information and gain some knowledge that can help me. Thank you for tuning in to Prayers and Blessings of the Podcast, where Faith, Flavor, and Focus Feeds the Soul. I'm your host, Mark Tyson. Remember, hug somebody and tell them you love them. And they just might hug you back and tell you they love you. I'm just saying.

SPEAKER_02 42:51

We pray very prayers. No time for the breath to no life is a blessing.