Dr. David R. Hamilton – When stuff goes wrong, doesn’t work out, or something happens to throw a spanner in the works, so to speak, it’s easy to feel that you’ve failed or that things will never work out, or even, as some do, lament that God or the Universe has it in for you.
These are times when we have an opportunity to reflect on our attitude, to double down on any inner or personal development work we’ve done and find a way to look at things differently.
I had such an opportunity today.
I got up early and spent most of the day filming a brand new online course that I’ll be launching in a few weeks’ time on how to deflect (or block) negative emotion.
I’ve spent weeks researching, writing, planning each lesson and exercise, working out how to best teach the techniques so they’re most helpful to people, writing accompanying PDFs of insights and exercises, and more. It’s been a lot of work. All I needed to do now was actually film the course.
Once the camera and lights were set up, I went for it. I love filming videos and publish a lot on social media.
It was only when I finished some hours later that we realised that there was no sound in any of the videos. None!! Why?
The microphone wasn’t connected properly! My bad. I took the connector out after I did a test and didn’t put it back in properly. Oops.
Now, hind sight is a wonderful thing. Why didn’t we listen back after the first couple of videos? My bad again. I was so in the zone that I wanted to carry on. As I said, I love making videos.
So did I waste a full day?
That’s what I might have lamented a few years ago.
No! Absolutely not!
In my mind, today was just a rehearsal. I’m genuinely so pleased the microphone mishap happened because it gives me an opportunity to do it even better when I film the lessons again. There’s always room for improvement.
Life is full of these sorts of things. Is a thing an obstacle or an opportunity? A mishap or a redirection? It’s whatever you make of it.
These are the mental gymnastics we need to do in our minds to adapt to life’s challenges. Fighting against seemingly negative things that happen doesn’t do our health any good. Finding a way to view things as lessons, opportunities, experiences, or to simply accept things as they are, is a healthier way of living life.
Some might say this is just deluding ourselves and that we need to sometimes accept facts. Yes, you can accept facts. Absolutely. But how you think and feel about the facts, your beliefs about the facts, and what you do next, is up to you.
It means that when shit happens (within reason, of course – I’m not referring to major health or other life effects that happen to us or loved ones), we don’t need to feel shit.
Attitude can help us navigate a safer course through the ups and downs of life.
Anyway, just a reflection on some of my life events from today. It’s handy when things like this happen because it gives me a subject to base my Daily Boost on.
Love, David
SF Source David Hamilton Aug 2022