Take The Time In 07

We often underestimate our ability to handle a problem that we have not faced before. We can erroneously believe that we can't do something only because we haven't tried or thoroughly thought about it.

M.Scott Peck, psychiatrist and author of The Road Less Traveled, makes this point when he describes how, at the age of 37, he first learned how to fix things.

Until then, he had considered himself a mechanical idiot, usually unable to do simple home repairs. Then, one day, he was walking and happened upon a neighbor repairing his lawn mower. Peck remarked, "Boy, I sure admire you. I've never been able to fix those kinds of things or do anything like that."

The neighbor responded, "That's because you don't take the time."

That answer struck home and Peck gave it careful consideration.

A few days later, the parking brake on a patient's car was stuck and she knew there was something that could be done under the dashboard that would release it, but she didn't know what.

Peck lay down on the floor of the front seat of her car, took his time to make himself comfortable there, examined the situation for a few minutes, saw at first a jumble of wires and tubes and rods, but then gradually figured out what most of them were for and focused his sight on the brake mechanisms. He traced its course and located a latch that, with a little pressure, sprung loose and released the brake. He felt like a master mechanic!

Of course, most of us don't possess sufficient technical knowledge to solve all of life's mechanical problems, but there are many for which we could devise a reasonably effective solution if didn't rush to judgment or despair.

Instead making yourself comfortable and taking the time to understand the problem, then thinking it through until a solution is found, can transform you from an armature into a master.

Too often, we try something hastily and when that doesn't immediately work, we give up and seek a repairman, or a psychiatrist or a consultant for people problems, when what we really need to to do is invest the time the problem demands.

So take the time in 2007 to solve the problem.