Hedging Your Bets
When life hands you lemons...find something naturally sweet instead
My New Year's Resolution has been the same for many years now: not to make any. As you might expect, I've been quite consistently successful in keeping it!
This doesn't mean that I don't bother to set goals or make plans to reach them. It's just that there's something about that word "resolution" that triggers my rebellious nature and sets me up to fail.
I'm a big fan of contingency planning, and look at it as a way of creating alternative successes in the face of "failure" to reach a particular goal. We OTs are masters of the art of graded activities, with the concordant incremental successes. But I believe we can expand our thinking on the concept to help our clients identify, create and/or recognize success that might not seem to be directly related to a particular goal they are having difficulty achieving. Here's an example from my own life:
In 6 weeks, I will be part of a group attempting to hike to the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, Africa. The round trip hike will take 7 days. There are many things that can prevent me from completing this adventure, not the least of which is inadequate physical conditioning prior to the attempt. Not in prime condition to begin with, due to chronic physical problems that limit the intensity of exercise I can tolerate, I had an 8-week setback this summer after having knee surgery with a weird complication. There are also potential barriers outside my control. These include life-threatening altitude sickness, which cannot actually be prevented by the medication available to mitigate the lesser symptoms; is irrelevant to level of conditioning; and can afflict someone who has successfully reached the summit in the past. So, there are multiple factors "conspiring" against my success at this endeavor.
Normally when a hiker is unable to continue past a particular elevation, he/she is escorted back down to the "departure town" of Arusha to wait in a tourist hotel for the group to return. This fate would fuel my disappointment something fierce, even though there are day tours I could arrange for myself while I wait. So, with the tour operator's help, I've made arrangements to stay with a local family instead. This family has confirmed that they are flexible enough to be able to welcome me into their home with possibly only a few hours' notice. So if I "fail" to reach the mountaintop, I will have the opportunity to experience the local culture to a much greater extent than our jam-packed group tour itinerary will allow.
I've been telling my friends, as they marvel at my ambition, that I'm assuming I won't make it to the Ceiling of Africa. Most of them chastise me for my "defeatist" attitude, but I don't see it that way at all. I am a realist, mostly accepting of my limitations. But with the prospect of getting acquainted with a local family, I see achievement of my travel goals in either outcome. If I were really defeatist, I would be dwelling on the fact that no matter what happens, I will have been deprived of the other experience!
So, Happy New Year, everyone! May we all find success in new forms.