Good struggle vs bad struggle

Not all struggle leads to personal growth. Learn to distinguish between good struggle vs bad struggle, so you can invest your emotional energy in the right areas.

May 21, 2025

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Read time: 2 minutes

There’s a difference between good struggle vs bad struggle.

I used to think all struggling meant I was “pushing myself” and “growing,” but that's not true. It took me a long time to learn this.

As an ambitious person, I had gotten good at gaslighting myself when I encountered a challenge that made me nervous:

“It’s not anxiety, it’s excitement!” I’d tell myself.

Sometimes anxiety is excitement.

But sometimes anxiety… is just anxiety.

At a certain point, I realized, “Actually I don’t really like doing X. And there are plenty of other ways I could invest my time that utilize my strengths.”

Good struggle is:

Thrashing to shape an idea
Practicing and learning a new skill
Answering hard questions about what to do
Messiness on the path to developing conviction

You can’t outsource this type of struggle, and it ends up being good for you in the long run.

Bad struggle is

Pontificating in circles
Overanalyzing and handwringing
Trying to change people you won’t ever get along with
Optimizing past the point of diminishing returns

Bad struggle doesn’t eventually lead to a positive outcome. It just makes you tired. Learn to distinguish between good struggle vs bad struggle. Invest your emotional energy in good struggle.

There’s an emotional cost to dealing with stuff you’re worried about. Do I want to be in this prolonged state? Sometimes, the upside is worth it—that’s why it’s useful to learn how to do hard things, because it gives you the optionality to decide whether to do the hard thing.

But we forget the other side of this optionality: You don’t HAVE to choose to do the hard thing. The “hard thing” is not necessarily better for you simply because it’s hard.

We have to stop blindly equating pain with growth, because sometimes pain does lead to growth, but other times, it’s a sign the environment you’re in is a bad fit.

If you always associate pain with growth, I believe you are likely to stay way too long in environments or functions that were never meant for you in the first place.

Environments where you’re barely able to survive much less thrive, and where you get pulled into a vicious cycle thinking you’re wrong for being the way you are.

And the solution isn’t to get better at gaslighting yourself about how you’re supposed to feel excited when you step outside your comfort zone.

The solution is to develop better self-awareness and instincts around when to keep pushing, and when to find a different activity or environment.

Have you ever conflated good struggle with bad struggle? What’s something you think might be ‘bad struggle’ that you can let go of, so you can spend more energy on ‘good struggle’?

Hit reply because I’d love to hear from you. Thanks for being here, and I’ll see you next Wednesday at 8am ET.

Wes

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