Lately, the news has been full of fires and floods. Seems like half of the United States is on fire (including my dear Oregon) and the other half is under water. And that’s just the United States! Add in genocide and more flooding in Asia, the international refugee crisis… the list goes on and on and on.
The World Has Enough
Now, it makes total sense that if we could just haul all the water from Houston and Florida that isn’t wanted there and pour it all over Oregon, Colorado, and all the other fires, our problems would be solved!
There’s no doubt that the world has enough water. It’s everywhere. But it isn’t in the right places all of the time. Sometimes water is the problem. Sometimes water is the solution. And sometimes it’s hard to get drinkable water where it needs to be (STILL Flint!).
I have no doubt that the solutions are all out there as well. You come here for my story and my experience. But I don’t know everything. I only know my little sliver of life. Someone knows the answer to your question, you just have to find them.
Look Outside Yourself
For work, my job is to find answers. I can tell you that 100% of the time, I don’t know the answers. Someone in my office asks a question about an illness, a behavior, a product, and then it comes to me. I’m in charge of looking at the research that has been done on that topic and find out who knows the answer.
Did you know that 100% of the time, the person who knows the answer is not in my network? 99% of the time, I’ve never heard of the person.
Every time we expand our network, we find more solutions. When we limit ourselves to our own pockets of people: political, religious, racial, gender, geographic, socioeconomic – we limit our way of thinking. The same solutions come up over and over again. When we look beyond, we find more answers.
What’s Your Question?
My main question upon starting this blog was: “How can I use our finances to help our family gain more control of our time?” That question lunged me into a network of amazing people that were looking at similar questions. This financial blogger world has introduced me to people that have figured out solutions to some of my questions.
The more I expand my network and hear the stories and experiences of others, I find more solutions. Sometimes I find I haven’t been asking the right questions. I learn. I grow. And I have more questions.
As the world burns and drowns at the same time, I hope that I am not part of the problem. I hope that I can be someone that listens.
Miguel @ The Rich Miser
Yes, and even when you think you know the answer, sometimes you don’t. I think it’s always a good idea to make a habit of regularly reading things that come from viewpoints different than yours. It can be uncomfortable to read, but is a great learning tool. It’s also good to talk to people from different walks of life, trying to keep an open mind.
MaggieBanks
Agreed. The more you expand your mind, the more you can realize what you’ve been doing wrong!
Revanche @ A Gai Shan Life
I’m amazingly lucky to have a circle of wise friends and, frequently, when I share my troubles with them, they have a suggestion or know someone who can help. The key here is that everyone has their own circles and we don’t have too much overlap. That means we have all the wisdom of their friends, and their friends, to draw on.
We also make sure to look out for opportunities to help one another proactively. If someone’s complaining and you may have answer, you speak up. It’s saved us so much trouble!
MaggieBanks
YES! Speak up! Great advice!
Chris @ Keep Thrifty
I’ve found a lot of benefit from trying to be open to hearing other peoples’ opinions and trying to find common ground – what are the things we can agree on? So much of the world (politics and otherwise) these days is about dividing into groups and shouting at each other. But the reality is we all probably want 98% of the same things and have the knowledge to get there. We just have to stop shouting about the 2% and start gathering around the 98%.
MaggieBanks
YES! I’m sure that’s true. We all care about a lot of the same things. Let’s focus on those. I hate how everything becomes a pawn in some political game and we forget about what we truly actually care about.
Matt @ Optimize Your Life
I think this is a mindset that is desperately lacking these days. Everyone thinks they have all the answers and nobody wants their opinions challenged. We need to allow ourselves not to have all the answers all the time. We need to allow ourselves the possibility of being wrong without hurting our egos. We need to be able to connect with others and honestly hear them and see them without being defensive of our ideas. Hopefully more people can work towards this mindset.
MaggieBanks
Oh yes. I always steer clear of people who think they know it all. THat shows me that they have a very pin-holed view of the world and they can probably actually offer very little.