Ctrl Z For Your Brain

These times are tough for most people – anyone who requires steady income to pay for the basic necessities of life. Many companies are downsizing or ‘right-sizing’. Whatever words you want to use, it still means many are losing their jobs and that steady income. To me this is just another form of change; drastic change maybe, but still change.

Most people have a difficult time with change because they can’t see a new future. Their minds continue to picture their world, as it was – same company, same role, same colleagues and same drive to work as they always had. A new view is needed in order to effectively drive forward or weather the storm; whichever you prefer.

My Mom helped me figure out a good process for this while playing a game. I was playing Free Cell on my laptop one day when she came over. I was stuck and ready to quit the game. She said I should use Control Z – hold down the Ctrl button and click Z.

“What’s that,” I asked. She said it was the undo button. WOW, an undo button!

“You mean I can go back, move by move until I feel good about starting again?”

“Yup!”

“Isn’t that cheating?”

“Why would they put it in the game if it was cheating?” she replied. Great point Mom!

Life’s not much different. We move through it making choices and ‘moves’ until we get stuck. Often we quit at that point feeling like a failure because we haven’t ‘won the game’. In reality, we can stay in the game by hitting Ctrl Z in our minds until we get back to a comfortable spot, and then make new decisions. The new decisions can now be made with all the lessons we learned while following the first path.

The opportunities that life provides us to use Ctrl Z and make new decisions based on all the lessons we have learned and the growth we have made are real blessings. They are not tragedies, failures or disappointments. They are another way we win the lottery.

I’ll detail more of my process around Ctrl Z in my next blog!