SPIRALING INTO CONTROL
By Dr. Nancy B. Irwin
Most of us feel that things are spiraling out of control from time to time. Life certainly throws challenges at us. What if it were possible to spiral into control?
Imagine if everything you do, think, feel carries into the next action, thought, feeling that you experience? What if everything were an endless circle rather than linear, with a fixed beginning and end, as most of us see it?
We all know there is a before, during, and after phase of most processes. There is a beginning, a middle, and an end. What if we began to see these phases as preparation, execution, and follow-through? How we release (follow-through) can directly affect the preparation phase of the next process we take on.
Athletes know this. How you follow-through on one shot directly affects subsequent ones. The golfers who throw their clubs down and swear at the ball after a shot are ruining the follow-through (and actually, mysteriously, the execution of the ball they just drove!), as well as the next shot. Those golfers, who extend the same positive energy through that crucial follow-through phase, improve. It’s a cumulative effect….a never-ending cycle. Do you want it to be helpful or hurtful?
How you follow-through on a job interview directly affects the interview you just left as well as all subsequent ones. Some interviewees walk out of a prospective boss’s office reviewing how well they handled some of the questions, what skill sets they might need to strengthen, etc. Some walk out with thoughts like “Who am I kidding? I was an idiot in there….he’d never hire me. I suck at interviews.” That attitude and negative energy sets you up perfectly to “blow” the next interview. If you have a positive follow-through, you have a more positive preparation period, and hence a more productive execution next time.
How you walk away from an unhealthy relationship directly affects all your subsequent ones. When your mate breaks up with you, do you make that mean “Love never works out for me. Women…you just can’t trust ‘em. It ALWAYS ends like this!” While you certainly have a right to feel upset/hurt/rejected/disappointed, honor those feelings, discharge them in a healthy manner (without blaming the entire opposite gender of our species), focus on what you’ve learned from this relationship, and let the pain go. That will lead you directly in preparing for the next relationship with more personal power.
How you walk out of an audition directly affects all of your subsequent ones. You can focus on the fact that you met a new casting director, got a chance to perform (albeit for free!), on refining your audition skills, networking with your peers, and more – – – all of which can feed into your next auditions.
It ain’t over when it’s over. The fat lady never stops singing! Allow that music (your “Inner Fat Lady”!) to carry you forward in that never-ending spiral of growth and learning in all areas of your life.
While there are many things out of our control, our response to any circumstance is well within our control. As Viktor Frankl states in Man’s Search for Meaning, “…everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
Spiral up!