Posts Tagged ‘problems’

Bog hopping

Wednesday, February 23rd, 2011

I was out walking today and had to come back via an unplanned route; a route that had I had any choice in, I’d have avoided as I suspected it would be a smidge muddy.  However, there I was, confronted with the reality of the situation and initially, although the path was 3” or more deep in water I was able to avoid it by scrambling up a parallel bank.  I was about 500 yards from the car and saw that I was confronted by more and deeper puddles. 

I should mention at this point that this area is home to well known bog.  I looked, assessed my options and decided that rather than face to known hazard of these puddles I’d take a chance and go off the path and try and pick a parallel path back, hopping from grassy hassock to hassock.  Initially this seemed to be working but as any of you who have tried to navigate through marshy ground will know, you never know when you are on solid ground.  I was only about 20’ from the path and suddenly found myself up to my knees in cold water and rather wishing I’d just marched through the puddles on the path!  Suddenly 20’ seemed a long way!

The odd thing was that once I got back to the path, I thought nothing of any the puddles or mud, and having already got thoroughly soaked, it hardly seemed such a big deal.  It left me thinking:-

  1. Sometimes the known problems are better than just hoping there is a better way
  2. That just accepting bit of something you don’t want can definitely be a the lesser of two evils, and
  3. Once the worst has happened, it is often not nearly as bad as you feared

Have you ever made matters worse by trying to avoid problems?

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Walking in the Rain

Wednesday, May 27th, 2009

I spent this morning walking round one of my favourite bits of Surrey.  It was pouring all the time we were out.  Odd as it sounds we really didn’t notice.   The thing is that we had on the right gear, and as we knew from the start that we would get wet, we didn’t need to spend anytime wondering or worrying about  it.

That got me thinking about all the times we spend worrying about “What if this happens?  What if that happens?!?”  It drains our energy and ruins our day, and, more often than not, it doesn’t happen!  And yet we have lived through all our imagined horrors. 

If we prepare as best we can and just get on with it is amazing how little we notice the ‘rain’, and if it happens, we are in the best state to handle whatever actually occurs.  Dealing with reality, in the moment is so much better than fighting imaginary monsters and ‘what ifs’.

“Some people walk in the rain, others just get wet.   Roger Miller

“Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add colour to my sunset sky.”  Rabindranath Tagore

 

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Whose mess is it anyway?

Monday, May 25th, 2009

The other day my sister was talking about an embarrassing situation.  This lead to a discussion about when you draw people’s attention to problems that you have found.  What do you do?  Tell them and get involved, or just hope that someone else deals with it?

At work one often comes across problems created by others; if you can’t simply fix them, are you supposed to draw attention to them or pretend you know nothing about them.  Every organisation has a cupboard full of problems that people know about and could be fixed if only they were drawn to the right person’s attention.  The thing that usually happens is that everyone can ignore these issues and hope that someone else deals with them, and your customers end up smelling something isn’t right!

How do you create a culture where mistakes and issues are aired and dealt without wasting time apportioning blame?

“There is luxury in self reproach. When we blame ourselves, we feel no one else has a right to blame us.”  Oscar Wilde

“You must not blame me if I do talk to the clouds.”   Henry David Thoreau

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Do you want more Beaver?

Wednesday, March 18th, 2009

South West Water are keen to reintroduce the beaver as an innovative way of helping manage their water system.  Apparently beaver are Nature’s way of purifying the water and preventing flooding and are considered to be an eco-friendly, cost effective way alternative to expensive flood defences & water treatment plants.  They do face resistance from landowners & farmers who are worried about damage the might cause.

Beaver were native to this country till the 16th century, although a few hung on for another 300 years. 

This represents another example of looking ‘outside the box’ for solutions and recognising that there are other solutions than the merely technological.  At times like these, every company needs to be looking for innovative, ecological, harmonious solutions to its problems.  How could you find a ‘beaver’ solution to the problems you face today?

“Impossible only means that you haven’t found the solution yet.”

“When the solution is simple, God is answering.”   Albert Einstein

Resources:

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Pussy stuck up a tree

Tuesday, October 14th, 2008

I was at a breakfast meeting early this morning when I noticed my pocket buzzing. I discretely peeked at the screen and saw it was my wife. Now I knew that:-

  1. She knew I was in a meeting, and wouldn’t interrupt if it wasn’t a problem
  2. She was meant to be elsewhere so something had happened, and finally..
  3. If I knew what was good for me I’d respond!

I left the room and called her back to hear that she was clearly upset. It turned out that our elderly and much loved cat had ascended one of our trees and was now stuck about 20 feet up and couldn’t get down, and was now also very distressed.

As I headed homewards, my morning suddenly rescheduled, I learned that my ever-resourceful daughter had contacted a neighbour who had managed to shin up and rescue her, although, she was in such a fearful state that she didn’t really co-operate with her heroic rescuer.

The thing is that it isn’t only cats who get themselves into situations which are just too scary to go on and don’t know how to get out of. From time to time we would all like someone to climb up and rescue us, but like Prim, we don’t always make it easy for others to help us. So if today finds you stuck up a metaphorical tree:-

  • Firstly stop what you are doing… it isn’t helping
  • Secondly, do something different. Anything different to break your state. Get up.. move around, leave the building
  • If someone suggests something, don’t tell them why it won’t work, try it… apparently you aren’t the expert you thought you were
  • If you can, sleep on it. Time can miraculously change things without human agency
  • If tomorrow finds you still ‘treed’ then ask for help

Good luck! Primmy is now relaxing with a bowl of pussy treats, being made much of and wondering why she had to work so hard for us to see her greatness!!

“What to do if you find yourself stuck in a crack in the ground underneath a giant boulder you can’t move, with no hope of rescue. Consider how lucky you are that life has been good to you so far. Alternatively, if life hasn’t been good to you so far, which given your current circumstances seems more likely, consider how lucky you are that it won’t be troubling you much longer.”  Douglas Adams

 

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Many ways to skin a cat

Tuesday, August 19th, 2008

Having never tried, of course, I wouldn’t know!  Today I was preparing for a business meeting which had the possibility of being a little difficult; it involved bringing together  a number of parties all with different needs and interests.  I had anticipated it foundering on the rocks of some of the ‘demands’ of the participants despite the fact that it appeared to me that there were wins for everyone if agreement was reached. 

I was called by one of the parties and had a meeting with one of the others, when a whole new way of looking  at this opened up and suddenly a rather neat, if somewhat different solution begun to present itself.  Obviously we won’t know till the meeting is held, but it is interesting that sometimes the solutions to our problem pops up in unexpected places, and of course, we can easily miss them if we always look in the same old places.

So if today you are wrestling with a problem, try looking somewhere new for your answers….

“Good questions outrank easy answers.”

“If we can really understand the problem, the answer will come out of it, because the answer is not separate from the problem”  Jiddu Krishnamurti

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Solutions

Tuesday, May 27th, 2008

The other day our 2 year old tumble dryer stopped working. It only stayed on stayed on for as long as you stood there with your finger on the button, hardly an effective solution. As we are deep in the midst of a spend-fest, the obvious solution seemed to be to just replace it. After all what do you expect these days… longevity? I knew it would cost the best part of £100 to get out a ‘little man’, and who knew what he would say when he got here and it would only cost £200 to replace.

My wife (clever lady!) suggested I check the web for diagnostic information; so of course, I did. I soon discovered that I was not the only person with this problem; this switch seemed to be an Achilles heel of this model. I managed to find Hoover’s spare parts site, and found the very switch at the princely sum of £6.95. So I slide the thing out and took off the top, and it appeared it would just push in/out. So given that I had already accepted the idea of replacing it, I took my courage in my hands, and yanked it out. It was clear that even for a non-techie like me, it was the work of 5 minutes to replace it.

So why am I wasting your time with the domestic trivia? Well, this made me wonder how often we jump to a solution such as “Fire him!” or something else dramatic, like that, when, with a little more investigation, we could find a much more ecological solution. As humans we love drama, and tend, particularly when we are stressed, to jump for the ‘big solution’. However, sitting down and talking, listening, a little fact finding and pondering can often come up with a tiny intervention that maintains a much more even-keeled progress.

So if today, you are unlucky enough to encounter a problem, don’t jump to the first solution; pause, consider what else you could do. Ask others what they would do. Imagine what someone you admire might do. Walk around the problem and you may well find there is a much gentler path up the ‘mountain’. Good luck!

“Never let a problem to be solved become more important than the person to be loved.” Barbara Johnson

“Don’t be pushed by your problems. Be led by your dreams.”

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