I had the honor of having dinner with one of my dear friends and colleagues a couple of weeks ago and we had a wonderful conversation this friend of mine is one of the most generous and amazing human beings. I think I've ever met in my entire life and he's confronted on a daily basis with a lot of other people's needs and that's both in his family is professional life in the immense amount of volunteer work that he does.
And so I was always inspired by his ability to meet those other individuals needs other people's needs in his life and so I asked them just point blank like how do you cope with all of the need that you have to fulfill on a daily basis and he had a very simple and easy response he just said you have to focus on the solutions he said there are always going to be problems he said but it's very important that we acknowledge the problems but don't dwell on them, he really emphasized the need to focus single minded.
Ly on the solutions that are available to us that there will always be problems that are distracting and they're always be problems that we cannot solve but he said it's important to focus on the solutions it's a it's about moving forward and what that means is that if we focus on the solutions and we're not just static we're not just fixating on the problems in front of us, but we can see those problems and move beyond that and take the next step and move into solving those problems and it was really interesting because we kind of, Came up with a really nice little three part model in order to move forward you have to acknowledge the problems with focus on the solutions if you want to stay static just stay focused on the problems and if you want a new move back you can start ignoring the problems so I think moving forwards the best approach here and I guess in my life when I think about the different challenges that I meet on a daily basis and whether or not I'm looking at the problem or trying to identify a solution, it can be from anything as minor as sending an email to his majors.
Existential crises about what I'm gonna do with my life so I think in these moments of reflection it's critically important that we acknowledge what the problem is, you know, what are the chat what is the challenge that we're having are we just distracted with other issues in our lives are we stressed out are we just tired or is it something within the challenge that we're facing that we really struggling with and once we acknowledge that okay, so how can we move beyond that what is the solution that's kind of wrapped up in that problem and Then to focus only on that solution kind of have that sense of purpose and single-mindedness, so we're not becoming distracted by the multiple other problems that surround any given issue.
That way we can move forward I often catch myself though still focusing on that problem. I don't really have good advice here in order to not or in order to at least try to and start inventing solutions but I I catch myself doing this on occasion and I think it's important as a reminder that we don't fixate on the problems that we move beyond the problems into what the solution might be and above all never ignore the problem ignoring the problem will never make it a go away and whether that's a social problem that you're just kind of constantly exposed.
To in your life, whether that's a specific issue that you're facing right now ignoring the problem doesn't make it go away it will fixate and it will become even more challenging.
