Three years ago I started having migraines.
I just suffered with them for three years before I even thought to explore the cause of them.
In the book Designing Your Life, Bill Burnett and Dave Evans talk about gravity problems. Gravity problems are problems we can’t do anything about. I can’t solve gravity. “It’s a situation, a circumstance, a fact of life.”
I guess I just thought my migraines were a gravity problem. They came monthly on the regular. I just assumed it was part of life and I just pressed forward masking the pain. OTC migraine medicine worked for a year and then stopped working. Personally, I’m not a big fan of medicine, so much of the time I’d just muster through them or try things like an ice pack.
In life coaching, we teach causal coaching. Let’s get to the cause. It took me three years, but I decided to see if my migraines were solvable.
Has that happened to you? You are just plugging along in your relationships and all of a sudden you are three years down the road wondering how and why you are in this place. How did you let it go on so long?
If you are thinking your relationship is a gravity problem—unsolvable, a fact of life, just the way it is, baby—I’d like you to think about your relationship as I talk about my migraines.
—Have you been suffering without really trying to problem-solve? Going through the same motions and hoping for different results?
—If you knew there was a solution and you also knew it would take a lot of work on your part and an investment of time, would you be willing to start down that road of healing? What if it takes a year? Or two? Or three?
—Have you given up?
We have a lot more power than we recognize. We also have a lot of resources (God, literature, coaches, therapists, doctors, etc) We also have time.
I know each of our experiences is unique. Please don’t take the things I’m sharing as a recipe for you. What I do want you to think about is ways you can provide relief in your life. Sometimes it may be finding solutions. Other times it may be making peace with the situation. Mainly I want you to ask yourself questions that will help bring enlightenment to you for you.
May God bless you on your journey.
