Problems Are Just Clues to Solutions

I have had enough problems in my life to realise that the problem itself is rarely the most useful thing to focus on. What matters is what has happened, what can be done about it, and what the problem might be telling you.

I learnt that quite young. When I discovered I couldn’t hear properly, I had to find another way to listen. I became more attentive to faces, lips, expressions and body language. I wasn’t overcoming my hearing loss. I was finding another way to communicate, and eventually I realised that listening differently had its own advantages.

Pancreatitis taught me something similar. At nineteen, I was suddenly dealing with something I couldn’t simply fix, and the possibility of another attack could become almost as consuming as the illness itself. Eventually I learnt to separate what was happening from what might happen and ask myself a more useful question: What can I do? What will I do?

That question followed me into travelling. I once missed a flight to Rhodes after a series of things went wrong on the way to the airport. The plane had gone, so I found another flight. Later, after travelling halfway around the world to find a yacht that would take me to the Caribbean, pancreatitis put me in hospital just before it sailed. That opportunity was gone, so I looked for another solution and found one that took me to Antibes.

I began to notice that when one solution disappeared, there was usually little value in standing around wishing it hadn’t. There was more value in looking for what was still possible.

It also changed the way I thought about fear. I don’t have time to live a problem that hasn’t happened yet. Preparing for something is useful. Imagining yourself already dealing with every possible version of it isn’t.

I learnt this through something much simpler than travelling or illness. When a glass is broken, all that matters initially is not causing another problem. Clean it up. Don’t stand there asking why it happened while someone could step on the pieces. The reason can be dealt with afterwards.

The Bahamas gave me plenty of opportunities to practise this way of thinking. The project produced problems I hadn’t anticipated, followed by visa difficulties, complications with the people involved and eventually detention. I couldn’t control everything that happened, but I could keep looking for the next thing I could do.

That way of thinking eventually found its way into my writing as well. I began looking at things around me as problems that might have another way of being approached. The Bumachunski Challenge came from looking for a way to create more opportunities to connect by saying hello. Socialising Equality came from looking at the expectations we place on each other in face-to-face interactions. Eight Guilt-Free Hours came from asking whether helping someone find time to read might be more useful than simply giving them another book.

Whether those solutions work is still something to be seen. But the process is the same: notice something that isn’t working, ask a different question and look for another possibility.

I don’t have time to live a problem that hasn’t happened yet, and when one does happen, my first thought is usually much simpler: what can I do about it?

Perhaps that is why I have come to see problems as clues. They don’t necessarily give you the answer, but they can tell you where to look.

Problems are just clues to solutions.

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#ProblemsAreCluesToSolutions #ProblemSolving #FindingSolutions #Fear #LifeProblems #LifeExperiences #LifeLessons #ModernLife #DifferentWaysOfThinking #Memoir #TravelMemoir #AustralianAuthor #DJGifford