You can do it...apparently
Somewhat recently, I had found it difficult to keep up with some of my coursework. I came across some really challenging topics while studying which then got me thinking about the concept of difficulty and what exactly it meant for something to be difficult.
Well, there's the dictionary definition which is 'not easy'. However, that was not what I was looking for so I decided to lose myself in my thoughts to see where that would take me. I arrived at a point where I thought "maybe it's not so difficult, I just think it is". No way that's true. I mean, it is clearly difficult and I am not the only one who thinks so. I then reconsidered my hypothesis and thought, well it may be difficult but knowing or believing that it is may make it even more difficult.
It is sort of like the situation when you perform well when no one is looking and poorly when say your coach starts watching. It is said that added pressure affects performance. With added pressure, even easy things appear much harder. Now how does this relate to a tough calculus question attempted on your own with no added pressure? Well we know that both the calculus problem and performing under pressure are difficult. I believe that the awareness of difficulty does play a part in influencing performance. Using a sample size of one, me, I observed that when I know something is difficult, I approach it differently. If something is easy to do, I learn how to do it and just do it. However, when I know something is difficult, I don't just learn how to do it but also about the various pitfalls to avoid while doing it. I end up trying to not get it wrong rather than trying to get it right. This becomes an issue in scenarios where I can avoid getting things wrong without necessarily getting it right.
This extends past solving calculus questions. It could also affect performance during an interview for example. Whether it is something relatively easy turned difficult due to the surrounding context or something inherently difficult, I would like to be conscious about trying to get it right rather than settle for just not getting it wrong.