The grey area

A suggestion for survival (and sanity) in South Africa’s leaderless society

Over coffee one morning a few years ago, a friend shared a drawing she had seen that was transforming the way she approached life. It was a simple Venn diagram: two circles overlapping. One circle was labelled, things that matter, the other, things you can control. And the area where they overlapped was greyed out and labelled: what you should focus on.

I copied that drawing into my notebook, tore it out later and stuck it on the wall above my desk, to remind me. It seemed like sensible advice to follow.

What I can’t control

In life there are things I can’t control — other people’s behaviour for a start (especially on social media and in the political arena, where normal rules of decent human conduct seem not to apply). Then there’s bad drivers, the weather, circumstances, global markets, the soaring price of food and petrol… the list goes on …

Living in South Africa, I’ve gotten used to shutting out the things I can’t control: the constant stream of bad news, the poor decisions of the people in power, the tragic unemployment rate, load shedding, water shortages and the weak rand.

I can’t do anything about any of it.

What I can control

And while my country does matter to me, I have to remember the grey area in that picture. Some things I just can’t control. I must only focus on the things I can.

And so I do. I focus on my day-to-day life in this beautiful country with its mountains, forests, oceans and opportunities. I focus on my husband and my kids and our hopes and plans for the future. I focus on the small differences I can make in the work that I do, in the way I raise my children, in how I use energy and interact with others. I focus on the people I meet every day who are doing great things on this continent and inspiring me to do the same.

I focus on what I really care about.

Simple, right?

When insanity knocks …

It’s not always simple.

Last night as South Africa’s president Jacob Zuma addressed parliament in his annual state of the nation speech, I had to dig deep to stay in that grey area, because his list of priorities for this country were all wrong in my opinion. He inspires nothing!

Yes, we need to boost the economy and implement austerity measures. But to me, it would make more sense to downsize the ANC’s bloated cabinet. Better still, why not let go of the most wasteful culprit once and for all?

Not to mention no plans to improve basic education or any practical measures by government to address the real needs of the poor.

It’s a mess.

And it’s wrong.

And it’s unfair!

It makes me angry. And I could so easily get swept along with the tide of blame and judgement of one man and his cohort of cronies.

It’s enough to drive me insane.

But.

Someone once wrote that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result. And the truth is that raging and screaming about the unfairness of life has never changed my world for the better. And it has certainly never made a positive impact on South Africa or the lives of those who live in it.

I have no other choice but to try something different and hope for a new result. I can’t control Zuma, nor any member of his ridiculously large cabinet, so I’m going to focus on what I can. And what matters to me.

What really matters?

What matters is that I live in this beautiful country; I choose to be here.

What matters is how I live in it and what I teach my children.

What matters is how I treat my fellow South African.

What matters is the whole of the nation, not one single man.

And those people — the ones who do what they can, who still have hope, who practise ubuntu and human kindness every day and who still believe in the bright future of this rainbow country — they’re the ones I’ll continue to be inspired by… no matter what colour they are.

Because right now…

I’m just focussing on that grey area.