The Best Thing

Last week’s tool had us looking at what we would want to eliminate from our lives.

This week we are taking a different approach. This week we are going to reflect on the things that seem to be going badly, but might actually be for the best.

There have been many times in my own life where things have not gone as planned. Some of these times have been full on disasters. When I was in the midst or right after these things happened I was devastated. Many times it felt like I had wasted time, energy, emotion and money only to have nothing to show for it.

Time went by. I lived through it. I started to feel better.

Then as time passed something strange happened: that thing that I had thought was the end of the world turned out to be the best possible outcome. I felt thankful for the ‘disaster.’

What would happen if we were already able to see that when the disaster was happening? I believe there would two outcomes. First, we wouldn’t feel so bad about what had gone wrong because we knew it was leading to something better. Second, we would work harder to take advantage of the opportunity because we could see the positive coming.

Even if we can’t see the future there is a way we can take advantage of this point of view.

This week when something isn’t going the way you would like ask yourself the question:

“What would have to happen so that one year from now I would say this thing that is going wrong is the best thing that ever happened to me?”

You mind will start to work and you will start to see the ways you can use this moment where things aren’t going right to your advantage.

I have personally used this question many times to move from a very frustrated funk to a highly productive period where I was able to make a lot of progress.

I would love to hear the ways you see this leading to better.