4 Questions To Help You Gain Perspective

You did a poor presentation and your boss is giving you an hard time, your friends have all deserted you, and your marriage is on the rocks. Well that’s what it feels like anyway. In reality, most things are rarely as bad as they seem. We often let such things as our emotions or our pride effect our view on life and this can make dealing with the problem or coming to terms with it that much harder. The answer is to gain a little perspective, but that’s not always easy to do. However, it is one of the most important life skills you can learn so in this post I want to provide my thoughts and experiences on it.

The first, and what I find to be a hugely undervalued step, is to try and get away from the problem and give yourself some breathing and thinking space. When you are in a tense, awkward or emotional situation it can often be difficult to think clearly and rationally. Surrounded by work colleagues or being in a noisy home environment will often only add to the problem. So get out! Hide in a toilet cubicle if necessary. And once you’re in a position to analyze what’s going on, for better or worse, ask yourself the following questions:

• Is my response appropriate? Maybe you are getting overly emotional over a small issue or maybe you’re not taking something as seriously as you should. Are you being too casual about your boss threatening to cut your department? Are you blowing your top because a friend happened to make an innocent joke about your weight? Consider whether you’re taking the issue personally or letting any feelings and emotions (or lack of them) cloud your judgment. Very often our perspective can be thrown off simply by not having evaluated the situation properly.
• How important will it be in a month’s time? Time really does heal and people really do forget, despite what it might feel like at the time. What is painful now may not be so bad in a few weeks or even days Even just having a good night’s sleep can make all the difference. And if there is anything in the future that you’re worrying about, consider what it will be like once it’s over and done with.
• How can I improve the situation? Feeling like you’re taking control of the situation is always an important step if you want to feel more comfortable about it. If things are getting heated and tense during an argument, consider how you could calm things down. If you said something hurtful, would apologizing help to mend things? Sometimes you simply have to take your mind off the problem – will watching a film or going shopping help that? Be proactive and consider what steps you can take to sooth your frayed emotions.
• What will I do differently next time? To truly gain a balanced perspective on the situation you need to feel like you’ve learned something from it. After all, if you put yourself through the mental and emotional torment, you don’t want to have to go through it again by making the same mistakes. What can you take away from the experience? What can you do differently next time? How can you cope better next time?