If you click the photo you will see a very short clip. It is from the movie Apollo 13, a classic directed by Ron Howard. What is very interesting about this clip, is something that you might think is standard operational procedure for people working at NASA. The ‘takeaway’, perhaps, is one does not have to work at NASA to understand the lesson.
In the movie (based on actual events) something has gone bad on the ship. There are many reasons to say why the ship has this particular problem. What I find so interesting about this clip (and the movie for that matter) is that little, if any, energy is spent walking around griping about the problem and ‘all that is’ wrong with it.. They can’t afford to do that as 3 astronauts’ lives depend on them fixing the problem, NOW. They collect what ‘is good’ on the ship, what they have to work with, and they design a solution to the problem.
And they move forward.
I like the idea of just the right amount of energy going into what causes the problem or what is wrong and more energy going into fixing the problem. My question is this; how much energy is spent in breaking something down when we see it, and how much energy is spent building something up?
You will clearly see more people jump on to the bandwagon to beat up someone who gets something wrong when it comes to diabetes, than commenting when a little cheerleader in the UK, with diabetes, wins a rack of awards, allows her self to be thrown 50 feet into the air, and has so much energy that you get tired just watching her; and she does it all while balancing and managing her diabetes. THAT is something that deserves our energy and our comments.
Do not misunderstand me, when something is wrong it needs to be corrected. Mama raised no fool and I understand that ‘outcry’ is what the media, and/or those in authority, need to hear loudly at times when they say or do something wrong.
But let me ask you a question; where did we leave Paula Deen, Miss Manners, or any other person who may have ‘got it’ wrong? I can tell you what happened that will last forever about a little boy who was encouraged; or a child who needed to hear that what he was doing was a good thing; when people took the time to build something/someone up, I can tell you that the ‘positive-ness’ had much more of a lasting impact. on those young lives.
There are two takeaways here. One is to make sure when you read something about someone doing something cool, especially kids, stop and hit like; don’t be afraid to leave a comment congratulating them—-it WILL make a difference.
Takeaway number two is that we need to take what we have when someone does something and try to find the power behind the overall picture. In the recent NY Times article, sure using a word like ‘gadget’ was not the correct choice for words; but there was a lot right in that article also. I’m afraid the ‘right stuff’ was lost because the bandwagon left the station with the masses already deciding that the important part was only the parts that were wrong, wrongly stated, and not reported the way we felt it necessary to report. Again, I cannot make the point any clearer–we must correct this when it happens. But I ask this; how quick do you think THAT health reporter will be to write anything again about T1 Diabetes? Is that REALLY what we want?
As I stated many times, getting something wrong is getting something wrong–our voices should be heard. People should respond when there is an outcry and anyone who writes accepts that point and should welcome the opportunity to ‘get it right’ or even correct it when needed—-it comes with the territory, as they say.
As the clip stated (and to fit this example), “We have this, we need to get to this, using only what we have.” Is it wrong to build something up with what was good, and find a better way to correct the wrong? We should not have to ‘settle for anything’ BUT we have to work with what we have and sometimes, not every time, that means to work with something that can be built upon and not knocked down completely. As my dear friend Dr. Richard Rubin used to say, “….find the balance…..’.
When doing an extension on a house, as any good builder will tell you, it is always better to leave what is good and build upon that foundation and not to knock it down to the ground and start over, unless it is completely rotted out. What we read and hear, sometimes, is not always completely ‘rotted out’, and much good remains to build upon; let’s do that when we can. Think about it.
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