Baby New Year has arrived! The season of parties and changed schedules is coming to its end. Back to the ‘normal’ routine! But what about those resolutions? The promises you make to yourself that come with the fine print that reads, “I maintain the option to not follow through with these resolutions because while I mean well, life truly gets in the way.”
A close friend shared her New Year’s resolution; she was NOT going to ‘sweat the small stuff’. My response was true to the bestie code: ‘Great idea! That’ll really make a difference! I support you!’ And when we parted ways, I got to thinking how as adults we want our children to know and recognize the difference between small, medium, and large problems however lose sight of those as we become adults.
Sometimes we need to step back and take an inventory of how we categorize problems or issues. While the resources I am using are predominately for children, it may be worth the extra 3 minutes to read through the rest of this post to reset your personal inventory and help your loved one manage his/hers.
Small Problems:
- Affects 1-2 people
- No one was physically hurt
- Feelings were minimally hurt
- Takes 5 – 15 min to ‘fix’
- Problem can be solved by the individual OR can be ignored completely
Medium Sized Problems:
- Affects 3-5 people
- May be a small physical injury
- Feelings were hurt, person/people upset
- May take 15 min to a couple of hours to ‘fix’
- Problem may need another adult to be solved
Large Sized Problems:
- Affects 6 or more people
- May be a significant physical injury
- No easy or quick solution to ‘fix’ hurt feelings
- May take days to weeks to ‘fix’
- Assistance of other adults is required to solve the issue.
While these are definitely oversimplified for some of life’s problems, they do provide a pause when thinking of day to day situations. Food for thought to start the New Year.
Yours in Speech,
Lakeshore Speech Therapy, LLC.