One word... Perspective

Perspective

The dictionary defines perspective as the following:

2

a : the interrelation in which a subject or its parts are mentally viewed ; also : point of view

b : the capacity to view things in their true relations or relative importance

 

It's a word that's come to mind a lot recently, for various and sundry reasons, but I started thinking about it while I was on a work trip with a coworker Saturday.  I was traveling with someone younger than I am and someone who, while pretty well-traveled in the world, is not as long on life experience as I suppose I am at nearly 42-years-old.  This person is also someone that I don't know super well and they didn't know me that well either, in terms of having had a lot of in-depth conversations with them.  Since we were together for a little over 12 hours, we definitely had some time to get to know each other.

 

I found that my traveling companion isn't one for sharing tons of information with the world at large and simply said that she did not understand social media like Facebook and Twitter.  I actually understand that, even though I have a clear addiction to both of those things, as well as blogging, even if I don't blog all that often.  I like to read blogs, catch up with folks on Facebook, see what my favorite celebs are squawking about on Twitter. I enjoy it.  But I can also understand how she "just doesn't get it".  She'd much rather you call her on the phone if you have news to share rather than emailing or posting a status update.  It's all about having a different perspective. 

 

Lately through various interactions with others, I have been reminded once again that how we perceive ourselves is often very different than how others perceive us.  It is well-known among those that, well, know me well! ha!, that I do not like having my picture taken. I really hate it.  When I was younger and skinnier, I had no big problem with it. I wanted my photo taken with the hope that it would turn out well and I'd look all cute and smiley and stuff.  I have a lot of pictures of me from the late 80s that my mother took that I was happy to pose for, but now, I really hate it.  Partly because every photo, even the crappy ones, seem to end up on social media frequently without consent of those who are in the photos and let's face it, if you do not like how you look in a photo, you don't want the world seeing it.  Someone once told me that all the pictures they saw me post of myself were good, so they didn't know why I thought I was not photogenic.  Um...of course I do not post pictures that are not flattering!  What? Am I stupid?  Psssshhhh!  Not about that!  I literally cried over some photos that were put on Facebook of me after my 20th class reunion. They were horrible and I finally got my friend to take them down, but I never could figure out why anyone at all thought those were pictures I would want someone to see.  I might have looked like that truly in that moment, but I didn't want to be reminded. 

 

What fascinates me about photos is that I can think I look horrible in pictures and some people sincerely seem to think those same photos are good ones.  I scratch my head in confusion over that, but we all have a different point of view.  A different perspective.

 

But back to my traveling companion...we had a lot of quality time together on Saturday and talked a good bit about this, that, and the other.  At one point I threw out casually something like, "When I lived in Dubai blah blah blah...." and she had to double-take.  "You lived in Dubai? When was that? I had no idea! You just threw that out so casually!"  Yeah, I did, because I figure most everyone knows that about me, even though that was 12 years ago which seems like, and really is, another lifetime.  I don't want to throw it out like it's this huge thing that makes me special or sounds like I am bragging.  So yeah, I guess I toss it out casually. 

 

I did the same thing - tossed it out pretty casually - during our trip about my experience with the Rotary Foundation's Group Study Exchange program that I was fortunate to participate in 6 years ago.  It's weird even now mentioning it all on my blog because I have to wonder if someone reading this thinks that I'm bragging in some way or trying to make someone feel "less than" because of something I have been able to do.  I never want to do that. 

 

I'm not special because of any of this; I'm just blessed.  I've been fortunate enough to do some amazing things in my life so far and I don't think I've really appreciated it all.  In fact, using the word "amazing" feels really strange.  Those things aren't amazing to some people and they are to others.  Perspective.

 

Saturday got me thinking about all of that.  About how I don't think my life has been that exciting or interesting, but the person I was telling my stories to seemed to disagree.  I won't dare to say that she was impressed, but she was interested.  My telling these things about myself added layers to who I am in her eyes.  I became someone a little different than I had been a few hours before.  And it was nice to have a reminder that yeah, I've been blessed and gotten to do some things that other folks will never get to do (and might not want to!).  It reminded me to stop and be grateful.  My tendency is to downplay that I've ever had anything interesting happen to me, but hey, a trip to the grocery store can be interesting if you look at it the right way!  So says the woman who has on occasion danced around the aisles with the shopping cart.  What can I say? Sometimes you get a snappy tune on that Musak they play.

 

I guess my ramble is really about remembering that everyone sees the same thing in different ways.  That everything is important and can be special.  That maybe how we see things is skewed from reality and that someone else's perspective is much more accurate than our own.  It was kind of cool to try and see things through this other person's eyes as she was hearing stories of my life.  You know, like, hey, maybe my life actually has been pretty interesting at times (whereas now a big night that excites me involves going home, getting into my jammies early and watching The Golden Girls while reading a book and going to be around 9:30pm).

 

So maybe now I have a little better perspective on some things.  And maybe I don't.  Time will tell.  But I'm pretty sure I will never be fond of photos!  Maybe if I start telling people that I think taking my picture will steal a piece of my soul that'll help stop the insanity.  Not mine, clearly, but the insanity of the need for photos of me.  Seriously. There are a lot of pictures of me in the world.  I think the world has enough.

 

 

Small changes

As human beings we are creatures of habit and most frequently I am a creature of bad habits.  This is not news to me and I often nurse those bad habits since repercussions are often few and far between.  I will now confess that one of my worst traits is being late. I'm not always late to everything, but I have this complete inability to be on time to work.  When I commuted over an hour to work and had to be at work even earlier than I have to now, I was actually on time or even early. Now, I live about 4 miles away and it takes me the maximum of 20 minutes to get here, but I am perpetually late.  It's not something I am proud of, but it's simply something that is.  Until the past week.

Every time I am late to work it runs through my head that I almost wish someone standing at the door glaring at me when I arrive so that I would feel more urgency in getting there on time.  At the same time, however, I want to be able to change my behavior simply because I know I should, not because someone is threatening me...well, whatever they decide to threaten me with to make me change. 

Finally last week I decided to make a change, just a small one, and see if that would get me to work on time and guess what?  It did!  So far for the past 5 days, I have not only arrived on time to work, but I have been early. Yes, early.  A small miracle indeed! haha!  I'm embarrassed to say exactly what small change I made because it's pretty stupid and piddly, but it worked and has so far been easy enough to stick with. Since I'm seeing such positive results right out of the gate, I think this will be easy enough to stick with.  And I must say that I'm pretty proud of myself too. 

Since I am always telling people to take baby steps and figure out what works for them to make any changes in their lives, I'm really trying to listen to myself.  I've been trying to give up soda cold turkey and finally threw that idea away, but I make every effort not to drink soda each day. I've been drinking a lot of water for years now, so adding in more water isn't going to make a big difference to me in terms of what I drink, but I got to the point of having 2 cans of some form of diet soda every day and now I'm trying not to have one at all each day, but if I decide I really want one, I don't beat myself up about it. Having one every 3 or 4 days is much better than having had 6 or 8 in that same time period!  I actually had a soda last night and afterwards thought, "This wasn't as good as I wanted it to be."  That's a telling thing to me. I plan to keep going forward, with baby steps.

I test drove another small change last night and that was putting down my iPhone and metaphorically walking away (metaphorically because I was laying on my bed watching TV at the time and just turned the phone over since I was too lazy to get up and move it on the other side of the room) from social media last night around 7:30pm.  Lately I've found that I fiddle with my phone and surf Facebook or Twitter until late in the evening at which point I finally realize it's time to get to bed and I never have picked up that book or magazine that I wanted to read.  For a while now I've deliberately tried not to boot up my computer at night because I can easily get caught up in reading blogs and checking various web sites if I do that, but the phone has become a big problem for me too, so I'm going to have to start weaning myself off of my evenings spent scanning social media.  I want a little to go a much longer way than it has so far. 

Small changes. I have faith that they will work.  Soon I'll start making more changes to my diet because that's certainly the most confused and messed up part of my life, but I want to get a firmer handle on the soda thing because I start declaring anything else off limits.  Just gonna keep putting one foot in front of the other I guess!