Are you focusing on what you can control or can’t control?

Much of the world in lockdown right now because of the Coronavirus pandemic and it’s interesting to see the wide range of responses that people have to these challenging times. All understandable, I might add.

You see, our response to a situation depends on what we focus on and in that we have a choice.

What we can’t control

If we focus on what we can’t control, like in this case for example…

…how quickly will the virus will spread, how many people will be affected, are people following the rules of how to behave in this situation, how will it impact the economy, and so on…

…we feel powerless, small, helpless, stressed, afraid, alone.

Impaired

When we focus on what we can’t control, we not only feel bad, but our bodies suffer from the stress, our thinking processes are impaired from useful evaluations and actions, and we do negative things to alleviate our suffering like overeating, and other addictive behaviours.

Influence

I can almost hear some of you saying, “But Alan, if I do my bit by staying at home I can control how quickly the virus spreads and how many people are affected”.

And to that I would just make one small but important adjustment… you can influence the outcome but you can’t control it.

There are things we can influence but do not have direct control over because there are so many other variables that have an influence over that outcome too.

Starting to feel better

Can you feel the difference when you move your focus from that which you can’t control to that which you have some influence over… it feels better, right?

But still, we need to be aware that we only have influence.

For example, if we start to think we can control someone’s behaviour, and they don’t do what we want, we can be right back there feeling stressed, but when we know that we only have influence, we can do what we can, and still know the result is not within our direct control.

What we can control

Now what if we focus on what we can control?

What can we control?

Ourselves… what we choose to focus on, what we think about, what things mean to us, what we decide to do, our actions.

In our example, we would focus on what the lockdown means to us at this time, how we can best respond to this situation, what the actions we can take to deal with these events that will best serve ourselves and others.

Response-ability

When we switch to what we can control personally, we feel empowered, stronger, more energised to take action, to mobilise our resources and make a difference.

Because what we are focusing on has changed, so has how we feel, then how we think, the decisions we make and the actions we take… we have set an entirely new direction for ourselves.

Life’s ups and downs

Events beyond our control will happen through out our lives. We all go through the ups and downs. No one is immune to life’s trials and tribulations…

So what can we do to best deal with these times?

Make a choice to bring your best self forward, your self that is mobilised to take positive action in your favour…

Choose to focus on what you can influence and preferably what you can control.