This will not only be advantageous to your career and your
business, but it will also help you find peace and comfort.
There is another great insight from Fred Rogers, which now goes
viral each time there is another unspeakable tragedy. “Always look
for the helpers,” he explained to his viewers who were scared or
disillusioned by the news. “There’s always someone who is trying to
help.... The world is full of doctors and nurses, police and firemen,
volunteers, neighbors and friends who are ready to jump in to help
when things go wrong.”
Make no mistake—this was not some glib reassurance. Rogers,
building on advice from his own mother when he was a child, had
managed to find comfort and goodness inside an event that would
provoke only pain and anger and fear in other people. And he figured
out how to communicate it in a way that continues to make the world
a better place long after his death.
So much of the distress we feel comes from reacting instinctually
instead of acting with conscientious deliberation. So much of what
we get wrong comes from the same place. We’re reacting to shadows.
We’re taking as certainties impressions we have yet to test. We’re not
stopping to put on our glasses and really look.
Your job, after you have emptied your mind, is to slow down and
think. To really think, on a regular basis.
... Think about what’s important to you.
... Think about what’s actually going on.
... Think about what might be hidden from view.
... Think about what the rest of the chessboard looks like.
... Think about what the meaning of life really is.
The choreographer Twyla Tharp provides an exercise for us to
follow:
Sit alone in a room and let your thoughts go wherever they
will. Do this for one minute.... Work up to ten minutes a
day of this mindless mental wandering. Then start paying
attention to your thoughts to see if a word or goal