Are You Limiting Your Own Potential?

If you’ve ever been to P&G’s headquarters in Cincinnati you know what it’s like to walk through the glass doors into the lobby, swipe your badge at the security gates (or collect a visitor’s badge and wait for your contact to escort you through), and then head to an elevator to get to where you need to go.

In the span of a few minutes, likely without even noticing it, you passed through a series of barriers—obstacles that are routine and expected, unremarkable only because dealing with them is second nature. 

Barriers aren’t always easy to deal with, and they aren’t always as clearly visible as an entrance or a security gate or an elevator door. If I look back over my career and think about all of the barriers I’ve faced, I’m surprised by how many of them have been self-imposed—and they typically are centered around one little word: “Can’t.”

The Secret Code of “Can’t”

Too often, “can’t” is a shorthand way of saying “I don’t know how to” or “I don’t want to.” With the exception of things that are immoral, illegal or flat-out violations of the laws of physics, there is nothing that we can’t do.

In the late 1990s, one of my sons had a project in his grade school class. His teacher asked him and his peers to write down anything that they felt they couldn’t do on pieces of paper. When they were done, the teacher collected the papers and took the class outside, where they ceremonially buried the papers before walking back inside. It seems like a strange assignment, but the message from his teacher was clear: when you refuse to accept “can’t,” you unlock the power of “can.”

This was a simple but effective illustration that the way we think, the language we use and the comments we make can all become barriers that limit ourselves and those around us. Often, we allow our inability to do something to become a barrier, artificially capping our abilities, keeping us from performing at a higher level and achieving our full potential. What we need to start saying is “We can’t…yet.” 

Every Barrier is an Opportunity

We need to see possibilities, not barriers. And we should start with ourselves. Ask yourself: Are you open and ready to engage? Are you ready to be vulnerable? Are you ready to be a little bit more humble? Are you ready to take some risks? Perhaps most importantly, are you ready to learn? These are the questions, and the challenges to yourself, that can open you up and enable you to see all the possibilities ahead of you. These are questions that can free you from your perceived limitations.

We can also help others see possibility instead of barriers. I believe in the power of positive gossip—a practice that leverages optimism as a force multiplier, which I picked up from Colin Powell. So many of us are all too willing to be critical and cynical, to divide and destroy. This isn’t helpful to anyone, including the cynics and critics. Instead, we should strive to create positive environments and to be the people who stop saying “we can’t” and who start saying “we’re going to be outstanding and I’m going to do my part to make it happen.”

While my son was burying all the things he felt he couldn’t do with his classmates, I was working in an office where I could see a sign on the wall that read, “Anything is possible.” And, below it there was a second sign that read, “Nothing is easy.” I still think of those signs today because they are an important reminder to stay positive in the face of challenges that I think we “can’t” overcome. Because often, if we honestly evaluate the situation and the barriers we’re facing, and we put in the needed effort, there is very little that we can’t do.