DON’T PUSH THE RIVER

Do you ever have one of those days where even simple tasks seem to get complicated? Or where your plans start to go awry? Or where you think you’ll just do a bit more of whatever it is, but it goes wrong/you break something/you mess it up somehow?

These are all symptoms of pushing the river, and in my experience, it never works. And the worst thing is, we know when we’re attempting to do it! it happens when we override our inner knowing with our heads. We have all those pop-up messages that say, ‘That’s enough for now’, or ‘It’s not the right time for this’, or ‘You need to stop for a little while’. Yet we counteract them with ‘yes, but’s’:

‘Yes, but I wanted to get this done.’

‘Yes, but I haven’t done much today’.

‘Yes, but I might not have time later in the week’.

And then we bash on, and the person we need to speak to is not available, we can’t get the two parts to fit together, our door key has mysteriously gone missing, the cake we made doesn’t rise properly, and it all gets more difficult and frustrating.

What’s the solution? Don’t push the river! When you get that pop-up message, take notice and walk away. Sit down for a five-minute break, have a cup of coffee, just stop for a minute.

Sometimes all it needs is a short break, and we can be back in the flow. Sometimes the short break enables us to realise that it’s not vital to do that now. And sometimes the break allows us to acknowledge that we’re just not in the right state of mind for whatever it is.

We all know that when we give up on just trying to bash on with something, it usually goes much more easily when we have another go tomorrow. So listen to your own wisdom and stop trying to push the river.

1 thought on “DON’T PUSH THE RIVER

  1. This is so true. I’m a decorator and found that I always wanted to do the next coat or another job. Those pop up messages would come up and when I ignored them I’d drop the paintbrush, knock the roller over, spill the paint… I soon started listening!

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