The Snowball Effect
itemed by Administrator (admin) on Jul 08 2009 at 2:56 PM
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POWER JOURNALING                                                                                                       July 2009

The Snowball Effect
 
I found myself becoming increasingly annoyed as I stared into the blank, bored face of the young woman behind the counter. I had searched a long time to find a printing company that could meet my specifications for producing the Customized Explorations Journals.  Now I had come to pick up a job only to discover that it had not been trimmed properly.  I was on a tight timetable, but the journals would have to be redone.  I could feel the snowball that started out as annoyance gathering mass and quickly becoming anger.
 
The woman gave me a disinterested shrug and suggested I come back later, but she wouldn’t give me an exact time. (The snowball began to roll down the hill.)  When I pressed, she said they were very busy and that she would call me when the job was complete.  But I needed to have the job done hours ago.  (The snowball was picking up both speed and volume, getting bigger and rolling faster.)
 
By the time I got home I had mentally burned her in effigy and decided the printer should be put out of business.  I felt compelled to take action—anything from calling her manager and demanding that she be fired to throwing eggs at their door.  The snowball was huge now, and about to destroy something.
 
 
The Snowball—Harnessed and Directed
 
Fortunately, I am familiar with the snowball effect and how it can have me lock into a point of view, get revved up, and take action that may not be in my best interest.  So, I stopped. I reached for my Customized Explorations Journal on Being A Magnet For Happiness.  I reined in my ego and spent five minutes writing down what I liked about the people I had interacted with at the print shop. I took another five minutes to explore, in writing, why I wanted the relationship with that printer to work. (The snowball was shifting course and beginning to head in a direction that served me!)
 
I calmly called the print shop and asked several questions that ultimately got my job completed and got me clear about how I could avoid similar problems in the future.
 
Since then my printer and I have hit a few more rough spots, but each time I kept looking for what was working—rather than what wasn’t—in my relationship with them, and stayed centered on what I wanted. Now I actually look forward to my trips to the printer and very much appreciate their work.
 
We’ve all had some experience with the snowball effect, but we usually think about it in terms of its negative potential.  The momentum the snowball effect produces, though, can work reliably in a positive direction as well.
 
Next time you find your thoughts snowballing in a way you don’t want, stop for a moment, breathe, and write down what you DO want.  As you write, let yourself get excited and enthusiastic.  You’ve just turned the snowball onto a new course that will gather the people, things and circumstances to attract what you want in life. Congratulations!
 
To learn more about the Customize Explorations Magnet Series Journals, click here!

Happy Journaling,

Eve   
 

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