The Mick Morris Musing

Exploring Resilience via Lifes Burning Issues

Tag: attitude (Page 6 of 13)

dance of social convention

August 1, 2011 /

Start the dance music….

Hi how are you?…. asked the person at the checkout, asked the person at the next store, and the one after that.

It’s the same question that you and I get asked countless times every day….

Will you take the lead?

How do you reply?

Today …. I felt like replying….. “Don’t beeeep ask, you are NOT really interested, and if I told you I feel like beeeeep and feel like I want to go on a rampage, you’d recoil at a million mile an hour and be calling for security and the police”….. but what did I say ” Good thanks, you?”

This dance of social convention goes on, day in day out……

Who really wants to dance anyway?

The truth is very few people really mean it when they ask, and very few people stop to think about what might REALLY be happening for the person who they asked.

Did they stop to consider:

They have a child in serious condition in hospital,

they have just come from treatment for a serious illness,

their partner has left them,

they have just come from the funeral of their best friend…… or a myriad of other possible scenarios.

Stop the music….

Let’s do something different…. let’s change the tune.

Let’s try a new question like…..

Now you can take the lead

A question like……… that’s your choice, but if you are going to do a social dance how about you choose

a) a question about which you would really be interested

b) a question that doesn’t make the other person feel compelled to give a glib answer

 

 

 

 

 

When things are foggy

May 8, 2011 /

when things are foggy

A morning fog….

This morning was one of the first days this year that I have woken up to a thick fog, that completely changed the drive to work and it set me thinking about when things are foggy.

Reduced Visibility

Obviously one of the first things that you notice when you wake up to a foggy day is that you can’t see as far as you usually can, your visible world has shrunk. It doesn’t mean that all those things that are usually there aren’t there it’s just that they have become obscured.

When setting off on a trip in these conditions the same applies to your journey, many of the landmarks, signposts and other clues that you would use to help guide you are obscured, but the road is still there and so is your ultimate destination.

A need to change focus

Driving in a fog causes you to change strategy about the way that you choose to light your path. You can’t hit high beam to push your way through the fog, it just causes the fog to appear thicker and brighter and it further reduces your visibility. You can’t just speed up and push your way through it ( well you can but you are just inviting a car wreck!). The fog causes you to change your focus and start looking at clues that are more immediate and closer to you than your usual length of focus. To get the best visibility  you need to use low beam or change the colour of the light you use by switching to fog lights. When you do this the fog becomes less intense and your visibility improves.

When life gets foggy

Many of life’s problems can act a bit like a blanket of fog. They obscure how much you can see and they hide your destination from you. They cause you to shift focus. Just like driving if you try to switch your life to high beam, or speed your life up to try to push through you just manage to make things less clear or rush headlong into a potential wreck.

Treat life’s fog like driving in the fog

  • slow down
  • reduce the intensity of your focus
  • use landmarks and signposts in your life that are close to you, one’s that you often usually don’t pay attention to you
  • change the way you light up the problem, it might allow you to see a way through that you can’t otherwise

What are your tips for safely navigating through life’s fog? Share them in the comments ….

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