ON WHERE IT ALL WENT WRONG
It’s all going on in the world at the moment, isn’t it, simplified this Philosopher-in-Residence. So, just where DID it all go wrong?
Was it the way we voted, the choices we made in our personal or professional lives? Perhaps chaos theory, innocent but harbinger butterflies making their mischief. Maybe it was inevitable, but we just didn’t know this at the time.
Whatever the weather, the increasingly brow-furrowing conundrum some of us faces, is that sense of malcontent and impotence (and your doctor is probably not listening, ears obscured by an unfit-for-purpose digital first booking system). We can’t do anything about much of our current lot, so we need to find a way to put up with it. Uggh.
Practising acceptance is recommended as the best way of coming to terms with something unwelcomed. Acceptance is REALLY hard. So, this fortnight, I’m going to suggest a simple hook that use can use to self-coach your way out of that instinct to want to blame something, or someone.
Whenever you feel the rage rising – it could be the state of world affairs, or someone cutting you up when you’re driving – just say, out loud or in your head, “I thought something like that could happen” Sounds like a really plain sentence, but that’s exactly the point. It helps you condition yourself to chop emotion out of responses to day-to-day issues. Plus, horrid as many things are in the macro- and micro-world you inhabit, (and by no means I belittle some of the abhorrent acts going on) this mantra helps you recall that it isn’t out of the ordinary for bad things to occur, and stop you spiralling into anger or misery as you observed something that makes you want to blame or despair. Try it, and let me know how you get on.
Next fortnight I’ll be writing On Ducks – watch out, this one will be a quacker! (sorry not sorry). Please get in touch with any particular aspects of this subject you’d like me to write about.
In the meantime,
Happy Planning
PS If you want some other free tips for your business life, check out the Working Well blog – out fortnightly on Wednesdays, courtesy of Make Me A Plan’s Productivity Expert, Penny Le Kelly. Browse the latest edition here: