Perspective

Have you ever hiked a mountain and marveled at the difference of the view looking UP the mountain versus looking DOWN the mountain?  Or, laid in the grass peering at the airplanes flying by and thought about how tiny the world looks from their view as they look out of their windows at the checkerboard below.

How much does perspective impact our lives?

Here is what Wikipedia (that “gold standard” 🙂 has to say about it:  One who “makes a mountain out of a molehill” is said to be greatly exaggerating the severity of the situation.^[2] In cognitive psychology, this form of distortion is called magnification.^[3] The term is also used to refer to one who has dwelled on a situation that has long passed and is therefore no longer significant.^[4]

The phrase is so common that a study by psychologists found that with respect to “familiarity” and “image value”, it ranks in the top quartile of the 203 common sayings they tested.^[5] It is an example of exaggerative accentuation.^[6]

Not only do we make mountains out of molehills but we also fail to see the forest for the trees. Since I was just in Germany I thought I would share this idiom in German:

Du siehst den Wald vor lauter Bäumen nicht.

• Translation: You fail to see the forest because of all the trees.
• Said when somebody fails to see the obvious solution to a problem.
• Equivalent: You can’t see the wood for the trees.
• Equivalent: You can’t see the forest for the trees.
• Meaning: You only see the details, but not the big picture.

So, we make mountains of molehills and fail to see those darn forest for the trees ahead.  Perspective is intertwined into our daily lives and the amount to which we seek proper perspective speaks volumes of our growth as individuals.  Often the best perspective is found when you step outside of your comfort zone (off the grass peering at the planes above) and reach out to others (you email that person on the plane who now has WiFi and ask them what the view is like from above) and you contemplate their view.  It is critical to reach out to people who are capable of providing wise counsel.  It is also critical that you open your ears and truly hear what they say, ponder on it, and see what growth you can gain from it.

When we step back and view the entire forest we often see solutions that were overwhelmed when our heads were stuck in the ground.  We grow as people.  We reduce our stress and anxiety.  We take ourselves into happier and more peaceful places in life.

A favorite phrase someone told me when my daughter was young was “she won’t be picking her nose, wearing diapers, etc. when she graduates high school”.  I like that thought because there are many things that we put effort into stressing over that truly will resolve themselves and in 10 years will not matter at all.  Certainly not worth the sleepless nights!!

I pray for each of you that you take a moment to step back from your life and find perspective.  During difficult times I try to picture Jesus on the cross.  I imagine his perspective, arms nailed down, excruciating pain, while he looked at the world he was dying for…and he never gave up.  He saw the BIG picture perspective from Heaven.

God bless your day!

“Being happy doesn’t mean that everything is perfect. It means that you’ve decided to look beyond the imperfections.” – unknown

“Humor is perhaps a sense of intellectual perspective:  an awareness that some things are really important, others not; and that the two kinds are most oddly jumbled in everyday affairs.” – Christopher Morely.