When Stubbornness is a Good Thing

“It gives me great pleasure indeed to see the stubbornness of an incorrigible nonconformist warmly acclaimed.”

~ Albert Einstein

Can stubbornness be a good thing? Perhaps it can!

If we think of the word in its worst form, it conjures negative, often anti-social, ideas about being difficult and unreasonable.

But turned on its head, stubbornness can illuminate some higher level personal qualities that can prove highly beneficial. Channeled in a positive fashion, your once sassy and childlike stubbornness can help you obstinately maintain a course of action when others all around you would succumb or surrender.

I hope you find today’s video, filmed in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, to demonstrate the positive side of stubbornness.

Though over a century old and taking place during a seemingly different era, it conveys an extraordinary tale of a real life, Stubborn Man. The man’s love for his home was so internally fixed and his unwillingness to move from his own values, desires and single-minded course of action ultimately delivered him great benefits.

In short, one rather insignificant, but stoically stubborn, man was successfully able to dictate his requests to the leadership of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire.

The outcome proved beneficial to both parties.

The former empire got what it wanted in constructing a Town Hall on the site of their choice. However, the empire didn’t get their new building until they submitted to the will — and filled the wallet — of a seemingly inconsequential, but stubbornly purposed, citizen. 

May the strength of your own stubbornness move something major in your life so that it happily complies with your wishes, too!

Maura Sweeney is an International Speaker on Influence, Leadership and Emotional Intelligence

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