How many times have you heard about an earthquake and thought something like “how terrible it must be to have to go through something like that” or “another earthquake, really those unlucky people can’t seem to catch a break” or “that is why I will never live there”. It’s true most often when we hear the word earthquake the first thing that comes to our mind are the tumultuous aftereffects of a major earthquake and the unbelievable wake of destruction which so often occurs.
However, unbeknownst to most people, earthquakes occur each and every day in each and every part of the earth. I know this not because I’m a Geologist nor do I play a Geologist on TV but I know this because I know how to Google, Bing and Yahoo! My limited internet research ability and lay understanding of earthquakes indicates that our planet consists of continuously shifting elements. This means that even at this very moment no matter where you are on this planet the earth is moving – quaking beneath your feet.
Fortunately for most of us, the movements are exceptionally slow and thus virtually undetectable. Nevertheless, there is definitely undeniable motion and movement occurring right beneath your feet 24 hours per day, 7 days a week and 365 days a year. In many ways, earthquakes are easy to explain and understand because they have so much in common with human interactions.
Everything is Moving and Changing.
Just as the planet is made up of constantly moving parts, your village consists of constantly moving people – people with different wants and needs, people with different thoughts and beliefs, people with varied hopes and expectations.
Each and every day, you and the people in your village are either moving in the same direction or you are moving in different directions. Moving together; flow and momentum. Moving in opposite direction; friction and frustration.
There is no such thing as a village or relationship that is standing still. You are either getting closer, your relationships are improving and you are gaining a better understanding of one another or you are growing further apart, your relationships are slowly disintegrating and you are methodically moving to a point where you soon won’t remember what you once had in common with or enjoyed about the other person.
Unfortunately, like the slow and virtually undetectable movements of the earth, most of us are unaware of the immediate and constant changes and repositioning that is occurring in our personal relationships with our children, friends and family. The earth is never content with its current status so perhaps we should follow the earth’s example and always work to find a way to improve ourselves and our relationships.
Beware of Pent-Up Energy
Massive earthquakes occur when the earth releases its pent-up energy. The more pent-up energy the earth tries to contain the greater the probability that the earth will quake – exploding and causing a great amount of death and destruction.
Relationships with our children and others in our village suffer the same ill effects as the earth does when there is an accumulation of pent-up energy.
How often have you had a friendship, an incident with a family member or a situation at work that well “blew-up”? In your attempt to explain to someone what occurred, why things “blew-up”, why you no longer associate with your ex-friend, why you got fired from your job, why you won’t attend the family reunion, you quote for them the Arabic proverb “the straw that broke the camel’s back”.
You reference this idiom in an attempt to express how – a straw – something that seems so lightweight, negligible in stature and inconsequential under any other circumstance could be the cause of something so earth-shattering – the end of a friendship, the termination of employment or the dissolution of a relationship.
Just like the earth, when we get to the point where there is no place remaining to store any new or additional pent-up energy, we explode and leave in our wake death (of longstanding friendships) and destruction (of family and domestic relationships). There has to be a way to reduce and prevent the likelihood of the kind of explosion which occurs as a result of great pent-up energy.
Early Warning and Detection
Fortunately, today we have made some technological advances that allow us to better understand, detect and even measure the magnitude of pending earthquakes. In some case, the technology has even allowed us to be able to design and construct buildings that are capable of sustaining the force of earthquakes while also reducing the potential for mass death and destruction.
Regrettably, there is no technological device like there is for earthquakes that allows us to detect when we are reaching the limit to what we are able to endure – when we have reached our proverbial breaking point and are upon the threshold of ending a professional, personal or family relationship. I suppose we could all submit to lie detector tests to gauge our true feelings but this seems like an arduous route to take considering all the personal, professional and family relationships we participate in each and every day.
The Immutable Law of the Real You
Alas there might be an option that would save us the heartache and sorrow that are the consequences of our individual earthquakes. The alternative to the explosion of pent-up energy is to apply what I term The Immutable Law of the Real You. The Immutable Law of the Real You is a three-part law that can prevent personal earthquakes. The Law requires that you do the following:
- You must recognize and acknowledge that you are not who you think you are (relinquish your ego);
- You must recognize and acknowledge that you are not who you believe others think you are (relinquish your imaginary self-importance); and
- You must recognize and acknowledge that you are only who those with whom you are in relationship with recognize and acknowledge you as being (accept as truth the opinion of the masses).
What The Law charges us to do is to look outside of ourselves and allow the reflection that is cast from those who are part of our village, those whom we have chosen to interact with to tell us about who we really are and the health of our relationships. The Law like today’s earthquake detection and measurement technology helps us assess our proximity to having our own individual major earthquakes. The Law requires us to care more about the feelings and opinion of others than we do about our own.
Finally, in the case of a child, the law reminds us that one can never consider themselves a great parent without having raised a great child. Claiming that you are a good or great parent without the accompanying evidence of a good or great child and verifying opinion of a good or great child is akin to a tree that is labeled an apple tree but has yet to produce any apples. An otherwise fruitless tree that for now stands on quaking ground.
Do you have any idea how your relationships are really going or are you going to be caught off guard by an earthquake?