“The question is not what you look at, but what you see.” Henry David Thoreau
What perspective are you wearing today? It can be helpful to ask ourselves this question because we’re often unaware of our perspective until we check-in with ourselves. It’s good to be aware because sometimes our current perspective is a powerful filter that can limit the possibilities we see. It can help to try on other more empowering perspectives.
PERSPECTIVE: the way we see things; the way we look at a situation; a mental view or outlook; what we believe to be true about a life situation or event.
Wearing a particular perspective is like wearing tinted glasses. Everything we see is colored a certain way. And since our minds naturally seek out confirmation of our pre-conceived ideas, we tend to gather evidence that confirms our point of view. What we think is what we’ll see.
Here are a few examples. You’ll notice that some are more empowering than others:
“This is such hard work.”
“Life is an amazing adventure.”
“I’ll never measure up.”
“I always get the raw end of the deal.”
“Life is just a crap shoot.”
“I don’t really have anything worthwhile to contribute.”
“I’m just no good at selling myself.”
“ It’s just the way I am.”
“I’m overwhelmed.”
“That’s just the way it is.”
“My life is a big long to-do list.”
“I can’t say no.”
“Life is a gift.”
“I have to sacrifice myself for the good of the team.”
“The world is a hostile, ugly place filled with awful people doing awful things.”
“I don’t have time to…….”
The perspective we wear at any given moment is merely ONE WAY OF LOOKING at the situation or our life. There are many other ways of looking that are also true! Often though, we get stuck in the perspective that is most automatic for us: our default perspective. It’s important to remind ourselves that when our default perspective isn’t working, we can choose to create new alternative perspectives. New perspectives allow us to see our life circumstances from different angles. In different colors. New perspectives can empower us and allow us to see possibility and change.
I was recently reminded how powerful it can be to shed a current perspective and try on a different one:
Yesterday morning I woke up feeling discouraged about a number of challenging life circumstances. When I checked in with myself about perspective, I realized I was in “Life sucks” perspective. Fortunately, I’m a subscriber to “Bread for the Journey”, a daily meditation sent to my e-mail account by the Henri Nouwen Society. (Henri is one of my favorite life mentors). Here’s what showed up that morning:
Wednesday April 24, 2013
Fulfilling a Mission
When we live our lives as missions, we become aware that there is a home from where we are sent and to where we have to return. We start thinking about ourselves as people who are in a faraway country to bring a message or work on a project, but only for a certain amount of time. When the message has been delivered and the project is finished, we want to return home to give an account of our mission and to rest from our labours.
One of the most important spiritual disciplines is to develop the knowledge that the years of our lives are years “on a mission.”
This short meditation was all I needed to shed the “Life Sucks” perspective. I chose to wear the “On a mission” perspective the rest of the day, and it completely changed my view. Even though circumstances had not changed, the world looked a lot brighter and I experienced encouragement.
What perspective are you wearing today? What is one alternative perspectives that is also true? Are you willing to try it on and see what happens?