You think YOU have problems…!
I just heard a speaker say that you don’t need to tell people your problems, 90% of people don’t care and the other 10% are glad you have them. It’s interesting. When I share things, it’s not about the “problems,” but actually simply about what’s going on. I don’t look for sympathy. Certainly, it’s as simple as understanding. In this week’s Wednesdays With Wayne I’ll take you for a look at problems… mine and yours. So, why am I shaking…?
I was at dinner with a friend I don’t get to see in person much. I explained that she might see my hand shake a little. I could feel it coming on and wanted to let her know I wasn’t having a seizure or going through DTs. My conversation was simply to convey information – there’s a hereditary condition that has to do with what’s known as an “essential tremor.” It comes on while stress, or sleep deprivation, or any number of reasons.
She asked me why I would share that with her, seemingly out of the blue. I just didn’t want to alarm her if my hand shook while getting food to my mouth. It IS a bit disconcerting, after all. It doesn’t happen all the time and since I had just flown cross country, I could feel the travel stress get to me.
She’s a dentist, so hand shaking is a big deal. And, as a certified yoga instructor, she took in this information and filtered it back to me that what I had offered was Non-Judgmental Acknowledgement –
I love that term. While I don’t own the tremor (I never say “my tremor”), I acknowledge that it exists and exhibits itself from time to time. She pointed out that I had shared information with her without it being a big dramatic (or traumatic) thing that needed fixing. It wasn’t a problem, in fact. It was simply a condition.
We all have “things.” We all have conditions or problems or not-good-enough scripts. We all deal with something, right? There’s no likert scale or ranking system. We don’t get points for “my problem is bigger and worse than yours.”
We all have our “stuff.” You WILL have problems in your life. The trick to dealing with them is whether you can have a little fun with what you’re doing.
You are going to have struggles. Sometimes the struggles seem never ending. Sometimes the struggles seem absurd. And sometimes, yes… sometimes, those struggles lead to failure. And, you have the right to fail. You then have choices.
You don’t get to drag others with you. My problems are not your problems. Your problems could be my challenges IF and only if I allow that to be. Right? So own your stuff. Don’t judge it. Learn from it. Laugh about it. And get out of the muck because it smells funky.
Use Non-Judgmental Acknowledgment to see what is. It’s like meditation only when you’re awake and aware. Sometimes my hand shakes when I eat or do book signings. That’s annoying and it’s not your problem. It’s also not good or bad. It’s just a thing.
What “thing” are you dealing with? Yeah… now, keep moving forward, okay??
You’ve got this!
Keep Making Your Magic™!!!!
Until next week!
~ Dr P ~