On Thursday June 16th, Miriam gave us a presentation entitled; “ Herding Cats” 

I have to begin by saying, I love the title of Miriam’s presentation. It puts a smile on my face. That aside, Miriam described Herding Cats as, the difficulty of getting people to agree on anything. The harder you try, the more frustrating and impossible it may become.  For example when ordering a pizza or two to be delivered, it can be difficult to get everyone to agree on the same toppings.  Miriam also described a recent situation when her family had gathered together for her Father’s memorial service, where she could not get several Aunt’s and Uncle’s to agree together on the same restaurant for dinner.  In fact once they decided where to meet, some of her relatives couldn’t find the restaurant.  Miriam said she learned from that particular situation that it’s impossible to control the uncontrollable.  Things sometimes will just collapse on their own and transcend into a new level. 

     If this should happen to you in a given situation, it’s possibly a good time to fall back into your own safety net.  Your initial assessment of the situation can determine your own reaction.  If necessary, you may even want to step outside, get some fresh air, and gain some new perspective. 

Miriam offered these steps to proceed:

1) determine your #1 priority 

2) assess what needs to be done 

3) prioritize

4) take inventory of your external and internal resources 

    – Internal resources can be your own life experiences, or just having the self-confidence to know you’ll come up with a solution to the problem. 

   – external resources may come from others in your group, who may be able to assist you in resolving the problem on hand. 

In handling situations, we need to accept the imperfections in our lives, and realize there will be different approaches to handling problems.

It’s important in these situations to:

1) prioritize by urgency, or the size of the problem 

2) determine what matters to you the most 

3) realize every approach has risks/ consequences 

4) control what you can control 

So, how do we prepare for chaos in our own life?

1) be ready, try to stay relaxed and be resilient 

2) learn to say no to people. After you’ve said no, ask others to help instead.  Asking for help is a sign of strength, not weakness.

3) make time for hobbies and exercise 

4) take time to “ wash out your brain and reframe your thoughts “

A challenge to take on; 

Try writing down three things you’re grateful for every day, for an entire month. No repeats allowed.  Sounds like a great exercise to me!  I plan on trying this one. 

A thought; try to remember that chaos causes us to adapt and change. 

If you start to realize that you can’t predict the future, or control everything in your life, that can be very freeing!  It’s important to adapt, and encourage yourself to stay resilient!