Probing our Problems (Part 1)

“You seem downcast. What’s up?” I asked her when I noticed some form of despair in her voice. “At the moment, I am not financially buoyant. I need money to meet my needs and help my family and my salary has just not been enough,” came the sincere response.

“Okay, I understand how overwhelmed you might feel about your present realities but do you have a long-term plan for changing the narrative?” I asked again. Some silenced swept through our conversation. I could sense her ashamedness, but again she answered honestly “Not really. I don’t have one.”

“Okay, how did you spend your last take-home pay?”

“I bought an android phone, some pieces of jewellery, and a few other items. A part of it has catered for my transportation so far and I have just a little amount left."

“Okay. I understand that you don’t have money at the moment and your salary has not been enough. But what if you had a house somewhere that you had built with the salary you have been receiving. Even if you had no money now, would you be happy?”

“Of course, I would!”

“Okay. Again, if you were working with a plan that guarantees a significant change in your financial status and consequent improvement in your standards of living at a particular time, would you be happy despite your present lack?”

“Why not? I would have had something to show for my labour and earnings.”

At that moment, my work was done. I had just shed light on her real problems and the sources of her hurt. She could see them with her own eyes. My subsequent explanation was concise and smooth.

Did you get the juice of that conversation?

My counselee’s real problem was not her lack. Better still, I should say that she was not hurt by her lack of money; she was hurt by her lack of fulfilment (she had nothing to show for her earnings since she was not saving) and her reaction to her present situation (she had no definite plan to change the narrative).

In his best-selling book, Stephen R. Covey, wisely noted, “It's not what happens to us, but our response to what happens to us that hurts us.”

Now, worrying and wishing – two default reactions we often give to negative situations – do not take away our problems, rather they aggravate our dilemma. The pain we feel from the problems we face are instructive. They are meant to stir us towards positive actions and growth.

A founding father of the United States, Benjamin Franklin, puts it this way: “Those things that hurt, instruct.” And prolific Christian psychologist, M. Scott Peck, underscored that “Problems call forth our courage and our wisdom; indeed, they create our courage and our wisdom.”

Responding positively to pain is one of the primary ways through which we grow. Adults who run away from pain can hardly be trusted and are usually difficult to live with because they want others to bear the consequences of their actions and inactions.

There are two factors that set our default response to challenges. In fact, they are the real source of our hurt and/or healing. These factors are our mindsets and habits.

Our mindset refers to our beliefs and ideologies; our pattern of thinking about ourselves and our environment. I like to call it the “tradition and culture of the mind.”

Do you think that your abilities are inborn and fixed or that they can be improved through commitment and hard work? Do you think that life happens to you or you determine what happens in life? These are examples of contrasting mindsets.

In this case, I am particular about the second contrast which is popularly referred to as responsive vs. reactive. To better understand the difference between these mindsets, consider what happened at the pool of Bethesda. Jesus met a man who had been sick with an infirmity for 38 years and asked him, “Do you want to be made well?”

The question was too clear to be misunderstood, yet instead of answering in the affirmative or otherwise, the sick man complained, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; but while I am coming, another steps down before me.”

The man was answering the wrong question. Jesus did not ask how he intended to get well, but if he wanted to get well. It was obvious to Jesus that the man had no means to get well at that time. Jesus was establishing the real premise for his getting well – a tangible desire for change – whereas the man’s mind was fixed on why he could never be well – his lack of help.

Most people are like that sick man, always talking about their problems and why they would not go away. Such a mindset hurt us because we think ourselves to be powerless over our situations. Our incapacity to exercise our will and enforce our desire intensifies our pain.

In fact, the major problem with that mindset is that it denies us the ability to see and seize the opportunities in our problems. Just as the man could not discern the unique solution that Jesus brought, we cannot even sense a solution when one comes by. Oh, how many people have turned away their angels with their rotten attitudes!

With the right mindset, we are not stranded by our problems; rather we ride on them to greater heights as eagles glide over the storm.

We do not think and ‘feel’ that things happen to us; we believe that we make things happen.

We see ourselves as a bundle of possibilities. We do not ask, “Why me?” but “Why not me?”

We leverage the power of our will to enforce our desire for positive change. We wield influence. We happen to life. We truly live!

Anticipate a sequel next week.

To your greatness,

Bright UK
The Chief Scribe