It’s All About Perspective
I woke up mad at myself this morning because I slept through my alarm and missed my morning workout. And I REALLY needed to work out. I was entering the day crabby and frustrated because things didn’t start as I had hoped and planned. My 6-year-old is home this week with no camps or planned activities and was already “bored”, so I thought my chances of a workout were doomed. I tried to do yoga on my deck but was interrupted too many times for that to be effective. So, I did something different.
I changed my perspective.
Instead of trying to find a quick workout that I could get in alone, I decided to take a chance and include my daughter. I asked her if she wanted to go on a hike. After getting through the ordeal of finding her the perfect hiking outfit (clothing is quite important to her at this stage) and getting her belt bag filled with snacks and water, and spraying on all the bug spray, we finally jumped in the car and headed to a local hiking area. We got out and she was excited, but also trepidatious. This was new to her – it was all unknown and there were bugs, and hills and sounds. She started off running, but quickly learned that she would need to pace herself. She would need to keep moving to keep the bugs from landing on her. And she would need to pay attention to see where to go next. As we got moving, we started talking and laughing. She pointed out things in nature and told me lots of fun facts she learned in school. We were having fun. I was breathing in the fresh air, going up and down hills, and getting movement in all while building a stronger bond with my daughter. I thought we were going to be able to take a shortcut back, but there was no shortcut so we did a 2 mile hike together. And my daughter nailed it! And better yet, she LOVED it. Maybe this is a new activity that we can do together or maybe it was just a lesson for me on what can happen when you change your perspective.
Too many times in business situations, things don’t go as planned. And we have a choice to make. We can stay frustrated or angry that things didn’t go our way. Or we can pivot. We can see things through another lens. We can try things another way. We can learn from others when we least expect it. And most of the time, we will realize there is more than one way to accomplish our goals.
