My daughter recently got upset with me because she said I ask her opinion and then do the opposite. Obviously, it was her perspective on the situation, so I thought about it. Not being sure if this was true, or to what degree, I decided that the next time I asked for her opinion, I would go with her opinion no matter what. I don’t ask her opinion on life altering events, so this seemed like a sane plan. And of course, I could ultimately better gauge my resistance by doing this.
It happened at a nail salon. She asked me what color I thought she should choose for her nail polish and then I asked her the same. She picked a flamingo pink color, which I had a hard time cherishing on my feet. But then I remembered my promise to myself and thought, it’s only nail polish and by making a different choice, I can show her that I value her opinion. I had my toes painted flamingo pink. I don’t expect simple acts like this one to immediately change a pattern of behavior, but I feel it is important to try new behaviors out in life. What I did realize is that resistance was getting in the way in this situation. With this new perspective on my part, I’m hoping that I can make more choices that will eventually influence my daughter toward a more positive feeling about the value of her opinion.
Sometimes resistance is good, like when we have a budget to live within and someone is trying to sell us something that we know we shouldn’t buy. But other times, resistance is not helpful to our relationships or for us. For today, think about your resistance to good ideas, different ideas, people, people’s behaviors and events that could ultimately provide you some unseen greater good, you’ve yet to experience.
It happened at a nail salon. She asked me what color I thought she should choose for her nail polish and then I asked her the same. She picked a flamingo pink color, which I had a hard time cherishing on my feet. But then I remembered my promise to myself and thought, it’s only nail polish and by making a different choice, I can show her that I value her opinion. I had my toes painted flamingo pink. I don’t expect simple acts like this one to immediately change a pattern of behavior, but I feel it is important to try new behaviors out in life. What I did realize is that resistance was getting in the way in this situation. With this new perspective on my part, I’m hoping that I can make more choices that will eventually influence my daughter toward a more positive feeling about the value of her opinion.
Sometimes resistance is good, like when we have a budget to live within and someone is trying to sell us something that we know we shouldn’t buy. But other times, resistance is not helpful to our relationships or for us. For today, think about your resistance to good ideas, different ideas, people, people’s behaviors and events that could ultimately provide you some unseen greater good, you’ve yet to experience.
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