BROOKE SNOW THE PODCAST – Episode 79
“Picture our life experience in the shape of the letter ‘U’.”
Or sometimes it’s our week experience, or our day experience. We are doing well, showing up how we want to show up in our lives and in the world, and then something happens. Maybe it’s something as small as a poor night’s sleep or someone’s words to us. Or maybe it’s something big like a health challenge or a lost job. Or maybe it’s hormones. Or maybe we don’t even know why, but we see a dip in a situation or in our relationships or in our energy or in our trust with ourselves. We dip.
“The most creative act a human can do is to turn something around.”
How can we turn it around? How can I create an environment or a thought or a solution that will turn it around, and we can rise up again?
A few thoughts today on this, from Brooke Snow.
FIRST.
Take a nap. Eat healthy. Meditate. Pray. Smile. Get a hug. Take a long hot bath. Etc. What does my body need right now? How can I care for myself right now? Strengthening myself can at times, by itself, turn me around.
SECOND.
“Be the change you want to see in the world.”
Gandhi
One of the relationships in my life right now has taken a dip – things were fine, and then they weren’t. I’ve spent a lot of time doing thoughtwork around that dip and around what needs to happen for our relationship to go up again. What I’ve learned from Brooke Castillo this past year is that what bothers us about someone else is often what bothers us about ourselves. And, true to that principle, what bothers me about this dear friend, her attitude toward our relationship, reflects exactly my attitude toward her.
Recognizing that that fault I see in her is a fault that I see and don’t like in myself – just recognizing this – gives me some leverage over it. By working on this specific fault in my own life, whether or not she continues to treat me the same, it will no longer bother me about her because it will no longer bother me about me. I will have cleaned that up in my own life.
Am I making sense? “Be the change that I want to see in (my friend).” I see that if I change in myself what I don’t like in others, whether or not they end up changing, that thing that I didn’t like in the first place will no longer have power over me. I will look at that fault with apathy at worst, mercy at best, but it will no longer be a reflection on what I don’t like about myself.
I can, single-handedly, turn around this relationship in my life, because a relationship only exists in my mind, right?
THIRD.
“In his book, Personality Isn’t Permanent, Dr Hardy shares this story of the British rowing team. The British rowing team hadn’t won a gold medal since 1912. How would they turn things around after almost 100 years of losing, as they prepared for the 2000 Sydney Olympics? ‘Their commitment was embodied in a single question they asked themselves before making any decision: Will it make the boat go faster?’
This one question allowed them to measure every situation, decision, and obstacle and to not get derailed from their objective. With every decision or opportunity every member of the team asked themselves: Will it make the boat go faster? If the answer was no, then they didn’t do it.”
Will me eating this donut make the boat go faster?
Will me making that comment make my marriage grow stronger?
Will me sleeping in make my upcoming race go better?
Really, whatever it is we are wanting to achieve.
Will me watching that show make my sleep more peaceful?
If it doesn’t help me turn around ____________ it’s not worth doing.
“And because they were committed, they got the gold they wanted.”
I want to talk a little more about this tomorrow – turning things around.
No Comment