Ask Why
Hey guys, alright, Workshop Wednesday. It’s the last Wednesday of the month. We officially have six months behind us, and we have six months ahead of us. 2022 is still destined to be either a great year or not such a great year. Sometimes that depends on how you look at it and what you think about.
So today, I want to talk a little bit about our successes and how we react to the things that happen to us and things that happen around us. I want to talk a little bit about maybe some of your emotions, but more importantly, I want to talk about when something goes wrong, what do you do first? Do you look for somebody to blame? Do you blame somebody else?
Many people are running from problem to problem. They never ever get relief because every problem they’re blaming somebody else, and they don’t realize their own part in that situation.
I’ve had, and even recently I had a young man ask me, “You know, you’ve been married like 28, 29 years now, Chad. So what advice can you give me because I’m getting married next week?” And I told him, I said, “The first thing that you need to do is learn to listen. The second thing you need to do is not blame your wife for stuff. The third thing you need to do is read a book on marriage with your wife every year. “
These are things that have helped me, and I even struggled with them in the beginning because it was easy to blame my wife for stuff. It was easy to not listen very well because my ears seemed to be plugged up, and I didn’t want to read. But as time went on, I started to realize that I needed to blame myself. I needed to recognize my part in this relationship.
Well, the same is true with relationships at work or any place else that you go. If you want to succeed in life, you need to stop blaming people. I see it at work every day. I even see it in my children. Right as a parent, I’m constantly listening to Jonathan blaming David, and David blaming Jonathan for stuff. As a parent, my job is to point out that it is not your job to control David, and it is not your job to control Jonathan. It is your job to control you and your emotions, the things you think, and the things that you do. And when you make a mistake, take ownership of it and learn from it.
Use mistakes as learning lessons. But you can’t do that if you’re constantly looking around you to find somebody else to blame.
And I’ve seen it here at work. I’ve seen people blame me. It’s my fault. I gave them a job, so it’s got to be my fault. I didn’t give them the best environment. They don’t think they got the right amount of training. They didn’t get enough, they didn’t get the SOPs or the… It’s always somebody else’s fault instead of taking ownership for their own part in it. Is there blame to share? Sure.
But if you’re focused 100 percent on getting somebody else to admit to their faults, you never take inventory of your own. Do you ask why?
So you can’t control always what’s done to you. You can’t control your boss. You can’t control the person driving down the street the wrong way. And you can’t control inflation and the environment. You can’t keep the government from printing more money and creating inflation. You can’t control gas prices. We can’t control anything, but we can control how we react to those things, and we can control what we do in the process. Maybe you need to drive less. Maybe we need to do some other things, and budget better, right? I see it, guys. I see the cost of stuff going up. Maybe we need to go out to eat less, less time at the coffee shop, and maybe drink more water. It’s cheaper than beer, I think. Of course, beer is cheaper than gas. Okay, anyway, don’t want to go there, guys.
It’s Workshop Wednesday, and I’m just talking to you a little bit about taking inventory and asking yourself why is this happening.
What can I do? What mistakes have I made? Ask why.
Stop focusing on who else you can find fault in in the process because it’s not going to change what happened. It’s not going to make it better. So move forward, and the next time perhaps there will be fewer mistakes on your part, and there’ll be fewer things, and you’ll see and you’ll be able to forecast and look out and notice things that are coming your way and be prepared for them so that they don’t impact you quite as heavily as the last time they did.
Alright, Workshop Wednesday’s over, you guys. Get back to work. Have a blessed, wonderful rest of your week. I can’t wait for the Fourth of July. How about you? Got a barbecue planned? Watching some fireworks? Alright, be valuable because nothing less will do. I’ll talk to you guys next week.