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 7/16/2007 |
Little nicks, little fires, big problems
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Little nicks, little fires, big problems
I was searching in the vending machine for something to eat for lunch today. Our vending machine is seriously devoid of anything healthy to eat, but I picked out a bag of Doritos and a drink, and sat down at my desk to eat the things.
You know – try as I might, I couldn’t easily break into the bag of chips. The packaging they used was tear-resistant. Fine for shipping, difficult for eating.
Fortunately, I knew just what to do – as we all do. Most of us wind up tearing the bags with our teeth, or cutting them with a knife, but I reached on my desk and picked up a small pair of cutting pliers. With the pliers, I made the tiniest nick in the package – and with that small nick, I was able to easily open the package.
In the same way as this little nick was all it took to start an opening in this tear-resistant package, so a little nick in our armor is sometimes all we need to harm our attitudes. When we let in a negative thought, a bad reaction, or an unkind word or deed, pretty soon, we find that our negative-resistant packaging is easier to tear asunder.
Like the Arabic story of a camel who manages to put his nose in under the tent flap, followed rapidly by the rest of him, one little mistake can make a big difference.
I drove through central Utah last week, and saw the devastation caused by a wildfire that has, at last count, burned over 300,000 acres. The wildfire started from a single lightning strike – and yet that strike, left unchecked and fueled by wind and a volatile “fuel load,” as they say, soon grew to a massive fire – and yet it started from just one little strike.
Here in the western United States, where I live, every summer seems to have similar stories. A careless teenager drops a match; a train throws off a few sparks; a campfire spreads beyond its boundaries. In minutes, the single point of ignition has spread to a much larger blaze, and left unchecked, it can soon spread to a massive wildfire that threatens life, property, and safety.
In our lives, one little event – one little negative thought that is allowed to find fertile ground, for example, soon can derail our positive progress, and force us to take major action to put our lives back on track. Like the bag of chips, one little nick in our armor is all we need.
How can we avoid these problems? How can we stop these wildfires before they stop? How can we avoid turning a little nick into a big tear in our attitude.
1. Don’t give the negative thoughts a place to grow. A fire that’s built on gravel, with no fuel to spur it to greater devastation, will not grow easily. One way fire crews deal with wildfires is by building “backfires,” which consume the fuel in a controlled area. In order to grow, a wildfire needs fuel – deprive the fuel, and a wildfire – or a negative thought – will die.
2. Don’t widen the tear. In our story of the bag of chips, all it took was one little nick to make it possible to open the bag – but I still had to widen the nick and tear open the bag. Many of us have little nicks in our personalities – but as long as we make certain not to make the little nick into a big tear, we’re going to be all right. Know your soft spots, the nicks in your personality, and make certain to keep them intact.
3. If a rift is started, or a wildfire catches hold, fix the problem while it’s still small. It’s a lot easier to fix a small tear than a big one – and it’s a lot easier to put out a small fire than it is to try and extinguish a massive wildfire.
4. Be vigilant in protecting yourself from others who would widen our weak spots for their own benefit – but realize that ultimately, you are in control of your own attitude, your own life, and how much you’ll allow that life to be altered through the actions of yourself and other people.
5. Make your weak spots stronger. Like a person who has a loose button on his or her pants, fix the weak spot, so that button, once loose, is now the strongest part of your wardrobe (all right, so I’ve gotten a bit carried away). Some years ago, I used an adhesive to repair an ancient headstone. Several years later, the stone was again damaged, but the repair held – the damage occurred in the stone, not in the adhesive. I had succeeded in making the weak spot much stronger than the surrounding stone (I eventually had the stone set horizontally into the ground – erosion had weakened it over the years; but that’s another story).
6. Lastly, realize your limitations, but never dwell on them. You want to be known for your strengths, not your weaknesses; your possibilities, never your limitations.
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