When I speak, I show people a YouTube clip called 'First World Problems'. It's actually an iPhone 6 advertisement, but it's a brilliant work of art!
With over 9 million hits - the term ‘first world problem’ has taken off! I use it to describe how perceptions rule our lives - and how silly the things most of us complain about are. Their very clever strategy is to give people a 'first world problem survival kit'! It consists of a straw, a picture of a bridge and a cup full of water with a lid.
After all these people complain about silly things - like the air con is at 73 degrees and they need it at 74, or they bought too many groceries and now they need to make two trips, or their iPhone is too big for their skinny jeans - someone brings out the survival kit. They then proceed to walk up to some of the people complaining and to one, they give a straw and say “suck it up”. To another, they give the picture of the bridge and say “get over it!” and the best - they walk up to someone whinging about some trivial thing, like the remote is too far away for them to reach, and with the cup of water in one hand and the lid in another they say “now, shut the full cup!!”
This clip is the most wonderful way to reframe and re-mind us of what really matters. Too many of us are focusing on, what we perceive as, wrong things - there is always something we can find wrong - but we are forgetting something really important. Something that can change our lives with very little effort. Something that takes no time but yields great results. We are forgetting to focus on what is right in our world!
There is always something wrong if we look for it. If we focus on it - which is what we normally do - then it consumes us and becomes all that we see. Life becomes full of things that are wrong. STOP IT!!!
Today it's your mission - should you chose to accept it - to go forth and find ONLY what is right today and focus on it. LOOK for what is right - LOOK for the good as I have said many times - and then focus on it.
Find what is right in everything that everyone around you does - including you! If it's raining, focus on how good it will be for the flowers and grass and water supply.
This of course takes conscious effort - our default mindset is to see what's wrong and let that infect everything! I talk about life being like a petri dish (remember from school experiments?). And we are the cell inside that petri dish which represents our lives. Inside the petri dish is the medium, which we have created and put in it. It's usually pretty good - but as always, there will be some 'black dots' in your wonderful clear life petri dish! And what do we do? We focus on the black dots!
Even though there are only 3 black dots - and the rest of our petri dish is full of lovely, wonderful clear stuff - all we see are the black dots! We focus on them and then it seems to us that life is nothing but black dots!
I say so many times - life is all about perceptions and choices. So - today - right now - find at least 3 things in your life that are right - focus on those for a few minutes. In each person you meet or know - find one thing right - and focus on that in your next interaction.
Each morning when you wake up - dwell on the things that are right in your life. Train your mind to do this. Exercise your will by consciously making the decision all day long to only focus on what is right.
Watch your world change! Notice how much more joy you have!
TA DA!!
