“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” – William Shakespeare, Hamlet
“It’s all invented anyway, so we might as well invent a story or a framework of meaning that enhances our quality of life and the life of those around us.” – Rosamund Stone Zander & Benjamin Zander from The Art of Possibility
Once in a while it helps to remember that it’s all invented. It’s easy to lose perspective, to get wrapped around the axle of circumstances and conditions that are completely made up in the first place. (Think of things like grades or performance reviews being valued OVER learning and contribution and you’ll be in the ballpark.)
There are two things I easily forget and I bet you do, too:
1) I’m a great storyteller. Human beings are gifted with this lightning fast limbic brain that puts emotion before reason. When emotion leads the way, justified by the insistent survival mechanisms of the brain stem (Seth Godin’s lizard brain) we masterfully create fictions too rich for publication. Dragged into the light of day they crumble to dust but in the fantasy factories of our minds they couldn’t be more real.
2) It’s not about me. The world is not waiting with bated breath for my next move. The people around me are not extras in the film production of my life. Everyone is fighting their own battle, making their own way. The sooner I get to an attitude – and supporting actions – of making it even the slightest bit easier for others to make their way, the sooner I will receive the support I need to do the same. It is the cosmic truth of the universe.
With a little practice – and the discipline of self-awareness – we can turn these common pitfalls to our advantage. The great storyteller can tell a new story. That means investigating our assumptions about what’s going on and shifting our thinking to the possibility of the new story that can take its place. As for the second one, we can start from a place of humility (literally, coming to ground) that is born of a commitment to create space for others rather than take it up for ourselves. The fact is, if it’s all about you and it’s all about me and it’s all about him and it’s all about her then, by default, it must be all about…all of us.
Chances are, when it all starts to feel like too much, when the overwhelm is creeping in and the window of opportunity appears to be closing fast, that we are telling ourselves an old story. That story is based on old assumptions and rooted in our self-centeredness.
Each of us can live into the possibility of a bigger self. In a beautiful paradox, that bigger self emerges only when we redefine “bigger” in a way that isn’t quite so big.
“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” – Viktor Frankl
