Deja Oops

Snow angel, Jason Wheeler

by Jason Wheeler

You have probably noticed this in other people. It’s always easier to spot their faults. But I have come to believe that nearly all of us go through life adapting, learning, evolving, changing…whatever you want to call it, in all but one area of our lives: the favorite mistakes.

Consciously or not, we struggle free from the traps we set for ourselves. We set out anew, disavowing the route that led us there. We seek new paths, and take forks in the road until finally we have done a complete circle and we’re mired in the same tar pit we seemed inextricably stuck in before.

If we’re enlightened enough to recognize our serial foul-ups, chances are (when we’re not stuck in the tar pit) we think we’re covering it pretty well. It’s my problem/proclivity/busines

s/fault and I will deal with it. Or maybe we unwittingly trip over the same cord time and again. Fact is, usually other people do see it…or at least they see symptoms of it…because the patterned faults are exhausting to the observer. The tentacles of our cyclical mess-ups and failures directly or indirectly reach into the lives, the happiness, the productivity, and the well being of others.

So forget the 2010 New Year’s resolutions. Decide to take on a problem today---one of your recurring boo boo’s---and get rid of it. If you don’t know the path that leads you away from it for good, and you probably don’t, at least do something that prevents you from falling into the tar trap as deeply, or as frequently, as usual.

And if you are blissfully ignorant of the mannerisms or mindsets you possess that are quietly, or not so silently, wreaking havoc on the people around you, put out a personal suggestion box asking people for submissions of what you must change.

Yes, you will get some stabs at humor in there, and you may even get a few mean spirited nasty-grams, but you might also get a clue about a problem you need to deal with…and about a problem the rest of us are tired of dealing with.