They might be thoroughly schooled in how to respond during an earthquake, and experience tremors often, but when the seventh biggest quake in history rattles your country and a tsunami slams into the coast and swallows everything in its path, you expect a bit of widespread panic.
We're used to seeing that on our screens during disasters or terrorist events of this magnitude - people screaming, crying and throwing themselves on the ground in despair. While some individuals may have responded in that way in Japan, the footage I've seen showed none of it.
Did you see the footage taken in a supermarket when the quake hit? The shelves may be flinging their produce sideways but people quickly 'got a grip'. The building had barely stopped shaking and you could hear the familiar 'bleep, bleep, bleep' of the bar code scanner. Business as usual.
Another video shows the skyscrapers of Tokyo swaying wildly following the earthquake. All that could be heard was the squeak of metal and some calm discussion. No yelling. No panic.
We can learn a lot from this approach.
Start today
It is unlikely that most of us will have to endure an earthquake or a tsunami in our lifetimes (thankfully). Many of us, however, have been guilty of more drama over mere blips and ripples in our daily lives than we witnessed over the weekend from the stoic, graceful people of Japan.
What purpose does our drama serve? Does it help us handle our challenges? Get us somewhere earlier? Make it easier to juggle multiple tasks? Assist us during a challenging conversation?
Or does it waste our time, expend our energy and draw our focus away from dealing with something that won't go away no matter how hysterical we become.
How much more useful might we be to ourselves (and others) if we handle the blips and ripples in our lives with applomb?
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment