Perspective. Perspective. Perspective. Being challenged to change ourselves is a perfect way to grow!
Were you ever in a situation where someone should probably be angry and throwing chairs and instead they were calm and collected? The calm person is a representation of this quote from Viktor Frankl, a holocaust survivor.
I highly recommend his book where this quote is from:
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Even though it was written long ago, it has many lessons we can learn from it and it truly is an incredible story he lived through surviving the Holocaust. I’d read it like 3 times now and continue to highlight new quotes. Highly recommend.
Anyways, when we are in situations that are highly emotional, or negatively charged it is a challenge to change the way we look at things, our perspective. In today’s world, people can be impulsive, insensitive, and just plain rude.
I’ve traveled to more than 26 countries and am from New Jersey…in my state, I’ve encountered more of this than I’d like to admit. I’ve also encountered rare moments of understanding or unsolicited help in foreign countries where I didn’t speak the language and felt lost. I’ve seen both sides.
When you can’t change a situation, think about if there’s anything to do to make it better or look at it differently. If your boss yells at you for something, remind yourself that you are doing your best and maybe your boss is having a bad day and simply can’t handle their own emotions. Step outside of the emotion so you can see what’s happening, get curious about it rather than heated. Heck, find any positive you can and monitor your own emotions by simply acknowledging them or taking some deep breaths.
An example of this is the experience I just had with remote learning. I recently had to become a teacher to my special needs child during COVID. Let’s just say I think teachers should get a million dollars a year and I am NOT teacher material. I know parents who gave up on homeschooling, who let their kids watch TV and didn’t follow the curriculum out of frustration. I could’ve done that, but instead, I changed the way I looked at it. It wasn’t about me…it was about my child’s needs to learn. I saw her side of the situation which was just as frustrating as mine…here she was pulled from school, her friends, her routine, it sucked!
So I changed my perspective, found online resources to help both of us work through the daily materials, and attempted to make the boring assignments as fun as possible.
Sometimes situations are out of our control. Other people are out of our control. We, on the other hand, are in control of how we see situations, solutions, and the possibilities outside.
Stay on the side of possibility. Accept the challenge to go within to find the change.
You got this!
