“It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.”~Anonymous
I have learned, over the years, that we get what we focus on. I have counseled my clients to be choosy about what they look at, to pay attention to what they pay attention to. But this quote captures it even more clearly.
Because we can all be looking at the same thing and see different things, and it’s what we actually see that matters. We have more of a choice about what we see – about how we take things in and what they mean to us – than we realize and sometimes admit. We have a choice to be Thoughtful and intentional, and to notice what matters to us.
My husband was looking through my son’s school record this afternoon. You could see all of his math scores, and you could see that his higher homework scores were balancing out his (slightly) lower quiz scores. You could choose to see that he was slipping in his study habits, and/or you could see that he was carrying a low A in the class. We had the choice about what information we wanted to take in, and how we wanted to interpret it. We also had a choice about how to look at, and engage with, my son. Did we see him as slipping, and chastise him, or did we see him as succeeding with a low A, and praise him? It mattered what we chose to see.
We have more of a choice on what we see than we admit, and what we choose to see has more of an effect on our days – and our lives, and our relationships – than we realize. It’s important to pay attention to what you look at, and to pay even more attention to what you see.
What do you choose to see?
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If you want to be Thoughtful about what you see, contact Robyn at rmcleod@chatsworthconsulting.com.
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