You Can’t Saw Sawdust

It’s a pretty obvious statement, isn’t it? Have you ever even heard of someone trying to saw sawdust? I guess not… The wood has already been sawed, the sawdust is the result. You can only work with the result and no amount of wishing or worrying is going to bring that wood back, so you can so something different with it. Maybe next time you get some wood you’ll choose to do things differently…

Here’s another phrase for you –  there’s no use crying over spilt milk. It’s the same thing isn’t it? You’ve spilt the milk, there’s nothing you can do about it. The milk is gone. Maybe next time you won’t leave the milk bottle on the edge of the table, but right now, you need to accept that the milk has gone and move on.

I’m not telling you anything new here, am I? So why is it that when something goes wrong, it can be really difficult just to accept it and move on? Often we waste hours worrying about what happened and wishing we’d done something different, but ultimately, we can’t turn back time, so we need to find a better way of dealing with it.

How about this? If something goes wrong…

• consider if you could have done it differently to achieve a better outcome
• do all you can to minimise the impact of the current situation
• learn from your mistake
• move on

It’s the last one that causes most people problems but there really is a simple solution. Your mind can only focus on one thing at a time. Yes, we can multi-task, but if you have something that you need to really concentrate on, then your mind will be fully occupied with that. So find something that completely absorbs you, gardening, painting, working, decorating, reading – what works for me, may not work for you, so you need to find your “thing”.  When you find yourself worrying over something that’s already happened, get busy with it, and you’ll be so absorbed with the present that you won’t be re-living the past.