As Katrina is barreling down the highway of life, her eyes are glued to the road ahead. She believes that the only way to get to where she is going is to never look back. If she keeps her eyes looking through the windshield, she will be okay. In order to keep up with the other drivers on the road, or in some cases not to get run over, she needs to keep moving and the best way is to make sure that she keeps her eyes on the road ahead.
After having been surprised a number of times as cars whiz past her, she rethinks her decision of only looking forward. Perhaps the rearview mirror is there for a reason. If she could see the cars coming, she might not be so erratic in her driving. Maybe if she glances in the rearview mirror every once in a while she won't be so surprised when things seemingly happen 'out of the blue'.
She notices that there are three rearview mirrors on her car. Each mirror gives her a slightly different perspective. The ones on the outside of her car allow her to see what is happening on each side of her car, what is going on right next to her. It will also give her the opportunity to be considerate of the other drivers on the road and how any move on her part is going to effect them.
Then there is the rearview mirror that is inside of her car. When she looks into that mirror, she can see what is going on quite a ways behind her. Seeing wehre she has been and how she got to where she is now. She can also see how the other drivers are driviing on the highway and how that influences her driving.
'It is probably wise to use the windshield more often than the rearveiw mirrors.' She thinks to herself. 'After all, I cannot keep moving forward effectively if all I do is look back. The mirrors are serving a purpose, but they are not the focal point. After all they are probably smaller than the windhshield for a reason. I guess there has to be a balance.'
We can learn from Katrina's driving experience:
- Time does not stand still and we need to keep moving ahead into the future
- We can learn to look at the present. There may be times when we find ourselves acting in ways that are not how we want to act, but we simply cannot stop ourselves in time. It is an automatic reaction. We don't like it, but we keep doing it. It makes us feel like we are bad for behaving the way we are and our erratic behavior is likely effecting others around us.
- We can learn to look back for context and see how the past influences the present. There are times when a look into the past is necessary in order to move ahead effectively. One of those times is when we are wanting to make sense of our thoughts, feelings and behavior that seem to come 'out of the blue' and surprise us.
That is a good time to use your rearview mirror to see what happened in the past that is still influencing us today. There may be some beliefs that we have picked up along the way that need to be changed in order to have our behavior change. Then moving forward becomes so much easier.
All our thoughts, feelings and behavior are based on what our beliefs are about ourselves, others and the world.
The Personal Tool entitled 'Changing Core Beliefs' explains the process in greater detail and gives steps to follow in order to identify what the beliefs are and how to go about changing them.
Note: I am currently working on getting this tool onto the website. I am aiming for the end of March 2024.