Life’s too short to be “right” all the time

Do you always need to put the world to right? have the last word in an argument? are you often grumpy? I was! until that changed.

A man winked at me on a plane yesterday. It happened after I had the privilege of helping a senior passenger to his seat. It wasn’t a derogatory wink or a sexist one — it was an empathetic gesture acknowledging the position I unwittingly found myself in. 30 year old me would have taken that wink quite differently and very likely given him a piece of my mind knowing that any wink by a strange man, directed towards a woman, was loaded with gender innuendo. Oh how I have changed!
Reflecting on myself in years gone by I was impatient, blunt (this trait is still a work in progress), always wanting to put the world to right immediately, always wanting to have the last word because I was right! The sad thing is all of this made me oh so grumpy.
Counter-intuitively former me was also successful, getting promoted and recognised for her “take no prisoners” approach. Quite frankly there were times when I was a bitch. Who knows how why my dearly beloved and friends all stuck with me? I frankly must owe many people apologies for past behaviour. Sorry.
So reflecting on that wink as I wrote this on the plane — what does about-to-turn-50 Victoria know that 25, 30, 35 or even 40 year old Victoria didn’t?

Kindness

“The level of our success is limited only by our imagination and no act of kindness, however small, is ever wasted.” -Aesop

It’s easy to bite, snap, quip and respond with sarcasm when things aren’t going your way. It’s much harder to respond with kinder, encouraging, positive messages. In keeping with “becoming the best version of yourself” acting with kindness also engenders positive results, loyalty and creates a cascading effect. If you need more evidence read the results of the kindness.org study (conducted by Oxford University) on how “7 days of intentional kindness” resulted in an improved outlook on life by participants.

The tragic tragic ChCh mosque shootings on March 15th changed Aotearoa for ever for many reasons, in the aftermath we all learned the real power kindness can bring to bear.

Patience

25 year old Victoria had 2 x babies so she simply never had time. Everything happened at lightning speed and while juggling 20 other things simultaneously. “Patience is a virtue” meant nothing to me back then, there was no time, everything had to be done immediately, now!
It turns out pausing, planning, considering angles, listening and accepting that things just take time (like the cheese adverts used to tell us) all leads to better outcomes.
Slow it down a little (I am not suggesting dramatically just a little). Pause and breathe. Consider and reflect — then respond with action. You don’t have to react in the moment to every situation.

Everyone has a perspective

As the saying goes — there are two sides to every story. Learning that, embedding it into your DNA is incredibly powerful. In business being able to envisage a range of outcomes and perspectives provides competitive advantage for instance.

It is easy to select a perspective that best fits your version of a circumstance. Seeing a situation different perspectives can materially change how you react and interact. Victoria of the past saw her perspective as reality and struggled (in the interest of always being right) to shift from that position. Consciously understanding differing perspectives changes your leadership style, relationships and outcomes.

Forgiveness is hard but …oh so necessary

Former Victoria held grudges for all kinds of seemingly good reasons at the time. Forgiving people for their actions — intentional and unintentional — removed so much negative energy from my life. I am not religious and have never been so this isn’t that kind of epiphany , I just wanted to be less grumpy fullstop.

To put it simply I realised that other people are just doing the right / best / selfish thing for themselves at any given time. Not everyone can see other perspectives or even consider the impact of their actions.
Selfish people do bother me the most, and let’s be honest many people are just plain old selfish. Realising I can’t change them, so holding a grudge is senseless, made my life heaps simpler and me less grumpy.

Need help deciding whether to hold a grudge or not? The New York Times has a quiz for you to take — Should I hold a Grudge?

What about when you are “right”?

Lets accept that for most people 99.99% of the time they are right (probably). Without being too much of a womansplainer here, the key piece of advice I can provide is to embody kindness, patience, seeing differing perspectives and forgiveness even when you are right. Right or wrong or just looking through a slightly different lens, as the bigger person your powers of persuasion escalate exponentially.

Life is just to short to be grumpy. As Elsa (and every girl under the age of 10 in our collective lives) tells us in song — Let it go!

“We live in a great country so helping every New Zealander reach their potential in life is something we can all aspire to achieve”. You can follow me on LinkedIN or on Twitter and read my context here.

This post is my personal opinion so while I wear many hats it doesn’t necessarily reflect the views and positions of the various organisations I represent. Vic