Changing Your Perspective
This week I’ve had to think a lot about putting myself in other people’s shoes to see things from their point of view.
It’s not always easy to do; actually, sometimes I don’t want to do it and sometimes I can’t do it, but I do usually at least always try to do it.
I think it makes me a better listener, a better colleague and a better friend.
Anais Nin (Diarist/Essayist) once said “ We don’t see things as they are, we see things as we are”. When things happen to us, we give meaning to it from our past experiences and based on our set of core beliefs.
There is always another way of looking at every situation.
We are all, only human. We all make mistakes; we all sometimes over react (well unless you are a Zen Master); we all have off days and we all need to stop and take a breath sometimes. It’s just that remembering to do this when you are really stressed out is the hardest thing to do, and, to do it consistently is even harder.
Being able to look at things from a different perspective, doesn’t necessarily mean working out what you would do in a particular situation; it’s more about trying to understand what someone else would do. You have to try to put yourself in their shoes, disregarding your own beliefs and understanding theirs.
Daniel Goldman’s take on empathy in Social Intelligence: The New Science of Social Intelligence is that “Self-absorption in all it’s forms kills empathy, let alone compassion. When we focus on ourselves our world contracts as our problems and preoccupations loom large. But when we focus on others, our world expands. Our own problems drift to the periphery of the mind and so seem smaller, and we increase our capacity for connection — or compassionate action”
I have always found that helping other people with issues helps me to forget my own problems and perhaps that’s one way to look at what he means here. When you get frustrated by something or someone, you can always think that actually there is bound to be someone who has more to complain about than you do. And is what this person has said to me, or done, really that bad in that sort of context. What are they going through in their life that I know nothing about, that I can’t begin to comprehend. How can that help me to understand them better and move to a place of mutual understanding and a more positive outcome.
What has also frustrated me this week, is the response over Caroline Flack’s death. I totally agree with the outcry about the way she was treated in the media. I’m just not sure that for all that is said about us being kinder to each other, that next week someone else won’t be put in exactly the same position. It’s just constant. The media build you up and then they knock you back down.
We should just always show compassion and understanding. It shouldn’t come posthumously when we are feeling guilty because someone has felt so bad about how they’ve been treated on social media that they’ve ended their life.
We need to teach our children that it’s not ok to be cruel to other people. To stop before we write something mean, before we take the piss out of someone. We teach them to be kind and to stop and think first. What if you were them? How would that make you feel? How do you think that will make them feel? And we need to set them a good example, always.
We need to stop feeding the machine. If people didn’t buy shitty newspapers that told lies and sensationalised people’s darkest times then maybe this wouldn’t happen again. So when you see that sort of headline again, don’t get sucked back in. Look for something else to read.
Anyway, thinking about problems from a different perspective is usually when creative ideas kick in. If you always do things in the same way, you’ll always get the same outcome.
“If you continue to think the way you have always thought, you’ll continue to get what you’ve always got. Is it enough?” — Paul J. Meyer.
Genius often comes from finding a new perspective, that no one else has thought of yet. Many scientists say that they find their best ideas and insight when not thinking about the specific problem they are trying to solve.
George Mandler, an Austrian-born American Psychologist, coined the term “Mind Popping” or “Mind-Pops” which just sounds such a fantastic term. It’s basically when an idea or solution just seems to appear after a period of incubation seemingly out of nowhere, like Archimedes’ “Eureka moment”.
The more problems, ideas and thoughts that you record and review from time to time, the more complex becomes the network of information in your mind. The more work you put into thinking about a problem and the more information you put into your long-term memory by systematically recording it, the more thoughts are put into random motion. Your subconscious mind never rests.
Occasionally then, a combination is made that is appreciated by your subconscious mind as a good combination and delivered up to the conscious mind as a mind popping idea.
This is why a journal is so useful, recording your creative ideas allowing your mind to mull things over when you aren’t consciously aware or even in your sleep.
Taking yourself away from a problem and doing something completely different like meditation or yoga or just going for a walk in nature can also give your mind the space it needs to cogitate more freely.
If you’re really stuck with an issue, getting some outside input and a fresh perspective can be really helpful. As can reverse engineering a problem, start with the worst possible outcome and deconstruct things from there. You might just learn how to counteract the issues.
A mind is like a parachute. It doesn’t work if it is not open — Frank Zappa
