Look!! Up in the Sky!! There’s another one!! (Part 2)

Make a choice:

Choice 1: If you’ve got only 30 seconds, draw your own conclusion about why these 2 pictures appear in a blog on leadership.

Choice 2: Skip Part 1, dive into Part 2:  Look, there’s another one!

Choice 3:  To get the background for Part 2, that includes recommend actions for the leader in all of us, read Part 1 here.

Harvard instructor David Ropeik describes in his guest essay “Balloon Freakout” a powerful learning opportunity. He says:

“We end up overfearing some things that arouse psychological fear factors, and we also sometimes dangerously underfear others based on the psychological factors they invoke.” 

In other words, when your lizard brain goes into a fear spiral over things beyond your control or understanding — mystery balloons or U.F.O.s or the aims of the People’s Liberation Army — step away from the news feed. Make a cup of tea. Throw on some New Wave tunes. And take a deep breath.

When our past-based fear clouds our present-moment view — and thus our effectiveness, it is indeed time to step away to stop the negative spiral into no possibility.

It might be as simple as pulling over and cleaning the bird poop – our rush to blame, our knee-jerk to be right – off the windshield.

PS: Curious about how to clean off the proverbial windshields of your relationships? Read Part 1.