To help yourself and others, don't get stuck in a hairball!
I just finished reading Gordon MacKenzie's humorous and thought-stretching book "Orbiting the Giant Hairball: A Corporate Fool's Guide to Surviving with Grace." Gordon is a free-spirit who worked for the Hallmark Corporation for over 30 years - and his book is a collection of anecdotal stories and advice of what it took to survive the corporate culture.
The "Giant Hairball" Gordon refers to is the suffocating and paralyzing corporate environment that exists in most older successful businesses (not to say they aren't there in young corps too). What starts off as a recipe for success, slowly evolves into a traditional and inflexible structure that crushes newness and creativity in response to protecting the status quo. Individuality and innovation are swallowed whole by the massive bureaucratic "hairball" the grows stronger and stronger as time goes on.
So, how do you survive the hairball?
Do you jump in feet first and try to defeat the hairball from the inside out? Or, do you stay as far away from the hairball as possible never taking the chance of getting sucked in?
Actually, neither.
The solution Gordan figured out for 30 years was to orbit the hairball. He was a part of the Hallmark team, their policies and culture - yet he never sacrificed his unique and individual identity that made him who he was. He never lost touch with his own passions, goals, and principles - even if it meant going against the status quo.
To Gordon, this is what it means to "orbit the giant hairball."
I began to think - what else could be hairballs?
What are your hairballs? Yeah, I wrote "hairballs," not "hairball," because let's be honest - we all have more than one.
Is it the corporate culture you currently work in? Is it the relationship you have with family members? Is it the view you have of politics or the world? More importantly, is your own hairball the view you have of yourself?
Let's say a friend comes to you and dumps a problem on you he/she is having with a mutual friend. Your friend is emotionally charged, and it is obvious they are looking for your reassurance in supporting their feelings.
What do you?
Well, if you agree with them and allow their emotional perspective to suck you into the hairball - you now become a helpless part of the problem. Because, when you are in the hairball - it is impossible to respond rationally and responsibly.
Or, do you turn your back on your friend and ignore their situation? If so, you are avoiding their plight by turning the other way as if it never happened, and at the same time, leaving your friend feeling ignored and slighted.
What do you do?
You orbit the hairball!
In order to orbit the hairball, you need to detach your own ego and accept that "your" own opinions really don't matter. As soon as you think they do - you are sucked into the hairball. But, if you can listen with supportive, non-judgmental, compassionate ears, you are able to get your own agenda out of the way in order to see an unbiased perspective. The result is that you have all the information on how the hairball operates - but you are removed to a safe distance where you can stay clear and composed.
"He couldn't see the forest from the trees."
Kind of brings that expression into focus a little bit. Hairball!
Or, how about, "And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God." - Romans
Wow, kind of brings that one into clearer light as well. Hairball!
The truth is, any hairball can be scary, messy, and seemingly impossible when you're in it, but when you become an observer, instead of a participant, it loses its power. It is a spiritual lesson I have known for awhile, yet continue to work on everyday.
Raising your thought (by removing it from the muck) pulls you out of the hairball where you can clearly see where the real problems lay - and then choose the correct (and opinionless) action. Or, as Mary Baker Eddy eloquently wrote,
"Progress takes off human shackles. The finite must yield to the infinite. Advancing to a higher plane of action, thought rises from the material sense to the spiritual, from the scholastic to the inspirational, and from the mortal to the immortal."
That is where I want to be :)
I would challenge all of you right now to take a look at the hairball you have you created for yourself based on passed experiences and perceptions. Does failing math in 10th grade still make you stupid? Does treating a boyfriend poorly 3 years ago still make you uncaring? Does remembering how your parents treated you as a child still make you unworthy of love?
I don't know what your hairball is for yourself - but we all have them. And, as long as we accept that as truth and operate within them - they will always hold us back.
In my mental house right now hairballs are being yakked up continually (thank God this is metaphorical). Like a hairball, the result can look messy, but it feels a whole lot better to have the hairball on the outside.
As a life-coach, it is my job to support you in coughing up your own suffocating hairballs - so give me a call.
Much love (meow),
Travis 561.676.4583
PS - My friend Traci Fenton from WorldBlu has done it again! She continues orbiting the largest of hairballs - and her work has once again been recognized - this time by the Wall Street Journal ! Check it out
