What do you see when you look up from working at your desk? I sit at one end of a table and behind the other end of the table is a large three-section window. It is great. Whenever I pause or need to think, I do so looking out at a vista of lovely green trees with a red brick house with black shutters way back in the background offering a nice contrast of color. I find looking out the window pleasing.
There is something else I see as I sit at my table. Below the window and above the convector there is about six inches of wall space. That in itself is not remarkable. The fact that the six inches in height and the width of the convector wall space is crusted and crumbling looking ugly is not pleasing. Furthermore, at this table I see my clients and having part of your wall crumbling doesn’t look good.
I live in a condo so there is a maintenance staff. I have held off asking for this to be fixed. I had my reasons. I didn’t know if it was something the condo covered or would I have to pay out of pocket. I also didn’t know when it could be scheduled to be done due to the fact my client schedule is often changing. Since I offer complete confidentiality to my clients the repair had to be done when I had no clients scheduled. Thirdly, I wondered if I had done something wrong to make this happen to the wall, such as not properly running my convector. If this was true, I was reluctant to have anyone come and look at it and tell me it was my fault.
Last week I had to drop off a form to the management office of the condo and out of nowhere I heard myself asking about getting my wall fixed because now it had also happened in another room as well.
The woman who schedules maintenance requests said it would be no problem and did I want them to do it Friday or Monday. When the guys came on Monday they explained to me why this crumbling sometimes happens and each got to work on a wall.
Why this long tedious story? I had been tolerating looking at the crumbling wall and being annoyed rather than just acting on it. All it took was a simple action to get something that was annoying and concerning me fixed. But because I made assumptions or didn’t ask any questions to relieve my concerns I had to keep tolerating something unnecessarily. This is not uncommon for those of us affected by ADHD. We struggle to act even on the smallest things.
Are there things in your life that you are tolerating? They don’t need to be earth- shattering things, my walls certainly weren’t. Nonetheless, the issue bugged me, took up mental space and was in my face everyday.
Lo and behold, there was an easy fix. How could I have known that? By asking.
Are there things you are tolerating because you are not asking the right questions. Think about all the tolerations in your life that could be obliterated just by asking a question or two. Do it right now. Think of something you’re tolerating and solve it either by yourself or with the help of others. Just get it out of your life. After you have done it once, find another toleration and fix that one also. Even better make a list of all your tolerations and start working to reduce that list as quickly as possible.
Not only will you lead a more unencumbered life, it will be a smoother life also. Do it now. You will feel a sense of accomplishment as each toleration is removed. Each sense of accomplishment will lead you to solve another problem that you are tolerating.
Don’t do what I did and stay stuck. Act now. I waited five years to fix the walls. I know you can do better than that.