Taking control
"Close your eyes & slowly allow yourself to fall back...". I dare say the ones who haven't done the 'trust' exercise with a team member are few and far between!
Letting go of the wheel and letting someone else take control is not something that sits well with us at all. As long as we have a modicum of control, or even the illusion of it sometimes, we find we can bear the toughest situation.
It's pretty much like looking at a 1000 piece jigsaw and feeling so overwhelmed at the sheer number of tiny pieces, that you never begin. But focus on identifying just one of the corners and with even as few as five pieces that fit together, you are filled with the confidence that it's not that big a puzzle after all!
It's happened with such predictability, that I can now swear by this approach to an overwhelming situation - after indulging in the best pity-party ever, sit yourself down with a pen and paper. Divide it into 2 columns and title them pros and cons respectively. Now comes the tricky part. Objectively looking at your situation and being honest about it.
Surprisingly, there WILL be something to put in the pros column, there almost always is. There's something about the act of putting pen to paper that clarifies a situation, allowing you to see it in black and white. Funny how so many positives get lost in the grey areas!
Once you have identified what the cons are, you narrow it down either by priority, or by what you can tackle first. The important thing is to finish the exercise with a clear cut sense of what you need to do next, in a clearly defined set of steps.
What you have done, in effect, is to carve up your huge problem into a grid of small squares and then zoom in on the ones you can fix right away.
Now you're back at the wheel and steering your own life again. And there's no better vantage point than being the captain of your own ship. The worst storm will be but a blip on your radar, to be steered through with minimum damage, so you come out on the other side looking as good as ever!
Keep looking ahead....calm water ahead, just around the next bend.
Once you have identified what the cons are, you narrow it down either by priority, or by what you can tackle first. The important thing is to finish the exercise with a clear cut sense of what you need to do next, in a clearly defined set of steps.
What you have done, in effect, is to carve up your huge problem into a grid of small squares and then zoom in on the ones you can fix right away.
Now you're back at the wheel and steering your own life again. And there's no better vantage point than being the captain of your own ship. The worst storm will be but a blip on your radar, to be steered through with minimum damage, so you come out on the other side looking as good as ever!
Keep looking ahead....calm water ahead, just around the next bend.
Nice :-)
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