It happens to all creative people. You begin a project with a sense of optimism and a clear idea of where you want to go. You have a map, happily start the journey, and are eager to reach the destination. And most times, it works. You keep on plugging away and you get there, even when it's not easy, even when the last few steps may feel like a slog.

Oftentimes, when things don't work out as planned, when we're sidetracked by some unanticipated event in our life, when the work itself presents obstacles we hadn't expected, we need to fall back upon our resilience. It's not a question of "if" you'll get stuck, but "when." And then an even more important question. What will you do to get unstuck, to get out of the quagmire?

I sit and think, reflecting on the obstacles in front of me and how to overcome them. Next, I go for a long walk and reflect, boosting my energy and re-framing my problem-solving perspective. If none of that works, I start talking to friends and family on the phone. I'll tell them what I'm trying to do, and what's getting in the way. If things are really bad, I arrange lunch meetings (of course I pick up the tab, they are helping me).

I'm lucky enough -- actually, it's not luck but the result of careful and constant nurturing -- to have good, smart, and caring friends who help me when I need it (and vice versa -- you need to help others to get help). Nearly always, the intervention of an objective third-party/friend (not the writer, not the client) does the trick and breaks the creative logjam.

Sometimes, by just allowing me to talk through what's happening, my friends solve the problem. They reflect back what I'm saying and ask me a few simple questions. Can you approach that in a different way? Have you considered moving that part or eliminating it? Do you really need that for the story? They help me re-map my journey, circumnavigating the obstacle that had blocked me before.

All creative professionals, and all people, need to develop resilience. No matter how brilliant, rich, smart, beautiful, deserving, generous, etc. you are, you WILL face obstacles that have the potential to harm you and the work you do. I often say that the most essential tool in any creative professional's toolbox isn't talent (talent is everywhere, actually) or "potential" (ex-Patriots head coach Bill Parcells used to say, "potential means you haven't done it yet, and might never"). It's the ability to overcome obstacles as they arise, i.e., resilience.

As I mentioned before, I have a process that helps me develop resilience. I do self-reflection while sitting. I go outside and walk in nature. I listen to birds or meditate or do things to empty my brain of the problem I'm confronting, I talk to friends about the issue. I also try to ask myself "what's at stake here?" and "what's the price of failure?" If not much is at stake and the cost of failure is low, I take my best shot to solve the problem and then simply move on. Life is too short to get lost in unimportant issues, like chasing a nickel into a quagmire. Why do that?

Develop resilience in your own way, dear reader, but you'll need it to succeed in anything in life. Not just at writing, but at work, at relationships, at parenting, at moments when times are toughest. My favorite people aren't the most talented, but the most determined and resilient ones. Grit may be the single most undervalued and most essential keys to success in life.

How do you react when you face obstacles, creatively or otherwise, dear reader? How do you develop your resilience? Share below . . .

Two big lessons from last week: first, eat lunch with people who work in different functions and jobs; second, outsource some tasks to save yourself work and frustration.

I work in a co-working space in Downtown Boston, and I'm a highly social person on most days (i.e., I often prefer to avoid work by chitchatting). The professionals in my co-working space are software developers, Big Data specialists, financial analysts, lawyers, real estate agents, and more. Many of them have become friends and advisers: building community is kinda what co-working is all about, and that's the part I enjoy most.

Anyway, I was eating lunch with Justin late last week. He's a millennial mobile app developer who works remotely for a bank headquartered in North Carolina (I won't disclose the bank's name). Justin is a friend, and we often eat lunch together outside and inside the coworking space we share. Like me, he likes football (especially UNC football and the Carolina Panthers) and good food -- he's also savvy about learning new things, which is the quality I like most in other people.

Over lunch inside the coworking space, I was complaining to Justin about the high number of interviews I needed to transcribe, and how stressed out that was making me. When I conduct interviews (with authors or business leaders/experts), I generally record the phone conversation into into an MP3 audio file and then do the transcription manually, which can take a tedious hour or two out of my life for each interview. I hate rewinding and toggling back.

For the record, Justin sometimes complains about having to do some of his coding work manually -- he loves to re-purpose already-developed code. In other words, my young friend is smart and productive.

After I'd complained about the tedium of transcription for about five minutes, Justin looked at me for a moment, "why don't you just automate it?" He had gained my full attention now. "Yep," he said, "you can just upload the MP3 audio file to an online transcription service. Many of these services are cheap, accurate, and quick."

I put down my fork, which was filled with chicken and rice, and pondered for a moment. "How can I find one of these transcription services you're talking about?" Justin is nothing if not diplomatic, and he scratched his chin for a second before answering my fairly stupid question. "Well, Chuck, you might want to start by doing a keyword search for 'transcription services' on Google." I almost jumped out of my seat to grab my laptop.

Fast-forward thirty minutes (bad joke intended), and I had found a great transcription service at a low price. I uploaded my MP3 audio files, and gave them my credit card number. Anyway, the transcripts came back the next day and were beautiful -- accurate and clean. I spent about 10-15 minutes editing each interview, and then happily submitted them to my client.

By paying someone else to do my transcription, I probably saved 5 hours that day, and felt much happier and more productive. As Justin sometimes says, doing things that are "efficient and scalable" just makes a lot of sense. So to recap, eat lunch with people smarter than you, share your problems, listen to their advice, then buy them lunch the next day.