A Lesson In Persistence From The Supermarket

I was in a supermarket the other day looking for a particular brand of raspberry jam.

Now, at first glance I couldn’t see it, but because I’m a stubborn so ‘n’ so I stood there and thought – “I’m not leaving until this jam turns up! No way!”

So, I kept looking, and looking and looking.  “Somewhere amongst those jars is my jam!”  I thought

I carried on in a demented fashion until “oh of course, there it is away from the OTHER raspberry jams on the shelf all on it’s own on the top shelf.  How logical!”

Mission accomplished. 

I do this often, when I can’t find what I want I will walk around and around, up and down, looking, looking, looking or I ask or I complain if it’s not there.  I’m like a dog with a bone.  I just refuse to accept that it’s not there.  Crazy really.  But isn’t it always the case that sometimes you just can’t ‘see’ things because you’re looking at it from the wrong perspective?  For instance, if I was 6ft tall I’d have seen the jam much more quickly, or conversely if it was on the bottom shelf and  I was only 3 ft high I’d have seen it earlier?  Get the picture?

We could give up and assume “nah, it ain’t gonna happen” and walk away.  But, if you’d hung around, figured every possible which way, eventually a way will be made.  I think they call it the slight edge – the ‘go the bit further take one more step, re-write the equation, make just one more call, ask just one more question’ approach.  See what I mean?

So, if you’re feeling that things aren’t happening.  Look on a different shelf, pause, think, walk up and down, ask, complain, search.  APPLY YOUR MIND.

“Oh” I hear you say  “You’re just being obsessive!”  Well was Ernest Shakleton obsessed when he left most of his crew in a cave at Elephant Island and promised to return – months later to rescue them?  Which actually happened by the way.

What about those ‘mad’ sailors who circumnavigated the globe single-handedly, or the ‘miracle man’ who was crippled in a plane crash, but healed himself purely by the power of his own thoughts, then eventually got up and walked out of the hospital on the day he said he would. 

Whatever they did was achieved by searching, looking and finding a way through in tiny heroic steps until they go there.

What have you almost given up on that you could apply 1000% of effort, give more thought to, look more closely, broaden your line of site or look at with a different pair of eyes, or from a different height?  Let me know …

Because if you don’t do it, there’s someone else out there who will – guaranteed.