Right on the heels of my posting about problems, I’m smacked in the face with a reminder of why this has to stay in the forefront.
What is the right answer when one individual looks at something and sees it as absolutely fine, and another sees the same things but as somehow lacking? By my definition, the one that sees the situation as lacking is the one who has the problem. What responsibility does the one who sees things as fine have on thier plate? I think it depends on the relationship. Unfortunately though, it can be a bit complicated.
On one hand, we are all closely related – we are all ONE. There are many, many people who do not subscribe to this belief. For those that do, our responsibility is to help others to the extent that assisting them:
- doesn’t cloud our vision or cause us to forget that we are part of ONE.
- is done out of Love and in alignment Spirit.
- helps them get closer to remembering that they are part of ONE.
For those that don’t subscribe to that belief, our responsibility depends on how we label the relationship:
- For a spouse or other loved one, likely our responsibility is to help them. This could be out of Love, or it could be out of appeasement. Or self preservation. Or family harmony, of one sort or another.
- For a friend, likely our responsibility is also to help but it will be offered on a less urgent basis than the previous. I might put coworker in this bucket as well, but helping them might also depend on how it advances one’s own career.
- Outside these groups, likely our responsibility is to do nothing.
I’m busy. My wife is busy. Even my daughter is busy. Therefore, things around the house sometimes aren’t done to the level that one or more of us would like. So the others, assuming we’re all closer to the ONE side of the split above, help out – whether we understand it or not. We all just accept it.
There are three types of problems that an individual can encounter.
- Mine
- Someone Else’s
- No one’s
My Problems
These are problems that I have created, either directly or indirectly. They are problems that have occurred due to my action or inaction, and therefore are completely in my purview to fix. They are, however, also the most difficult to fix. Why? They often require me to change my perspective or my thinking, and that can be quite a challenge.
Occasionally, I perceive my problems to be someone else’s. When that happens, I’m forced to step back and consider. If my next brilliant idea falls flat on it’s face for example, I’m just as likely to think the idea must have been flawed as I am to think no one understood it and therefore they are all idiots. The reality is that it’s a combination of things that caused it to fail, but that list doesn’t include “they’re all idiots”.
Someone Else’s
Given the above discussion, the definition of someone else’s problem should be clear.
The challenge with these problems is that I often make them into my problem. If someone around me is having a bad day, I might make it my goal to fix it for example. Helping others is nice of course, but making their problems into mine is not helping anyone. In the end, I can’t fix their bad day – only the person having the bad day can fix it.
No One’s
These problems are the ones that occur day to day and that no one can do anything about. Death, tornado, earthquake, and the like. There is nothing to be gained by struggling against these things, yet many people worry about them on a regular basis. True, we can do things to predict them, slow them or in other ways impact them, but in the end they will and do occur. I believe that struggling against them is futile and a waste of effort.
One of my coworkers picked up a magnetic desk sculpture – one with acrobats and bars, and on it is written “Work life. Personal life. Help your employees balance both.”
I’ve never liked that work life/home life delineation. It reminds me of the old Roses are Red rhyme:
Roses are Red,
Violets are Blue,
I’m schizophrenic,
and so am I.
If we really have to balance, that implies that there are to conflicting sets of demands. The “work” demands and the “home” demands. If indeed they conflict, then the easiest way to balance them is to entirely segregate them. Segregating in this manner only serves to decrease our effectiveness at, and passion for, all the things we do. Think of a machine, created with unlimited capabilities but segmented into various pieces that do not share information. Those pieces might be working on different things, but if the machine were capable of sharing information it might well figure out that the seemingly unrelated tasks are really one in the same! Sharing that information leads to better results, and a byproduct of it is the reintegration of the segments.
There are lots of these schizophrenic situations including
- Parent/Spouse,
- Boss/Friend,
- Teacher/Doer, and (of course)
- Spouse/Movie Buff.
I’m sure you can come up with your own pairings.
In reality, you and I may be all those and more at the same time.
So, the question isn’t how do you balance these but rather “How do you incorporate these?”. You incorporate them by trusting that there is order to things, and that everything will get done at exactly the right time. There are times where one part of you will need more attention – that’s fine. Tight deadlines at work or the upcoming release of “Astroboy”, for example. Those times will be balanced – golfing with co-workers or celebrating an anniversary. In the end, order will help to balance things out.
Don’t try to exert too much influence; sometimes it’s easier to treat the whole than the sum of the parts.
