Focus on the outcome.
Have you ever reacted in a way that ended up causing you to get exactly what you DIDN’T want?
Yeah…me too!
As I wrote my book, I realized that my reactions often created outcomes that I had not foreseen, nor that I wanted. It was almost as if I was the cause of my own misery and what I was doing to fix it only caused more problems and often more of a rift in relationships that I desperately wanted connection and understanding from.
“What is the outcome I want?”
This question is one I have put into practice for myself to create an internal dialogue and a type of mental stop sign to keep myself from saying or doing things that will get me the opposite of my desired outcome.
Full disclosure - this plan is not fail-proof or fool-proof. Why? Simply put, because we are human! It’s just another tool to add to your toolbox. Often, our emotional reactions move from our brains and hearts straight out of our mouths before we can even get the first word of that question to form.
The question and the image of the stop sign are meant to create a gap between a stimulus and the thing that we say or do. When we do not think through what we say or do, that’s a knee-jerk reaction. When we can ask the question, create the stop sign in our minds, take a moment to think on how we want to proceed, we have created a gap and can respond instead of reacting.
In Maslow’s hierarchy of needs we see our first needs are physiological needs (food, water, shelter), then safety (security, stability, and protection) the third on the pyramid is Love and Belonging (social connections and relationships), next is esteem (self-esteem and recognition) and finally self-actualization (fulfillment of our potential and personal growth). Love and Belonging is third on the pyramid. It’s pretty darn important.
Too often our reactions cause us to get further away from what we want in life. When we can consider what outcome we want, we can also consider how what we are about to say or do might impact the person we are responding to. We can then assess whether our words or actions will be received positively or negatively or whether they are in a space to receive our words or actions at all.
Consider what happens when we don’t assess our words or actions and simply react:
I tell my husband I’ll throw his clothes in the dryer when I get up in the morning because he’s ready for bed and the washer hasn’t finished up. Since I’m up before my husband the clothes will have plenty of time to dry before he wakes up and needs them. I get up in the morning, but have other things on my mind, feeding the dog, packing my lunch, answering an email I forgot to answer yesterday, and before I realize he’s awake and opens the dryer only to find it’s empty and instead of waking up to dry clothes, his clothes is still wet and in the washer. He’s immediately frustrated and under his breath says he should have just stayed up and done it himself. This makes me feel some kind of way and I tell him he should have planned better in the first place and gotten his clothes started earlier the night before.
Does this type of reactionary response ever happen in your relationships? Most of us can relate. None of us want to start the day frustrated or frustrate someone we love, but things happen, life happens, and things can go sideways. Too frequently in situations like this we react and our reactions cause conflict (not the healthy kind). This conflict can lead to us seeing one another as unhelpful, untrustworthy, incapable, and less than (a good partner, a decent human, etc.).
This all makes sense when we read it or hear it from a calm place, right? Of course, we simply need to consider what it is we want the outcome to be and act accordingly. Easy, peasy!
…NOT SO FAST! If it were that easy, we’d all have wonderful, tumultuous free, healthy relationships filled with excellent communication all the time.
The truth is, we are given these tools but so often not an understanding of practicing them and instead we want to have perfected the use of the tool immediately. When we don’t, we struggle with feeling like we’ve failed. This can lead to defensiveness and a continuation of the cycle I talked about earlier.
We have to practice these tools, which means we will fail…miserably at times. I recently watched my grandson during a wrestling meet. He just started wrestling this year and he’s still learning, so when he goes to shoot in on an opponent or use a move he has learned, he doesn’t always execute it to perfection. He is able to give himself grace, his teammates give him grace, and his coaches give him grace. They understand he is still learning and has yet to perfect his craft. We should give ourselves as much grace when learning to use new tools. When we successfully use a tool, we can build on that win. We also know that when practicing we will make mistakes. We have to navigate those mistakes by being accountable and then trying again.
This is the heart and soul of it. We build strength when we practice and fail, and we build confidence when we practice and get it right. Focus on the outcome you want, keep working at it until you get it right and then take a moment to give yourself a pat on the back. Keep using those tools to stay in that space but when you fail, give yourself grace, take accountability and then keep practicing and using that tool.
