I know it is Boxing Day, so I thought I would tell a family story, since we try to get together each year at this time.

When one of my daughters was young, in the you’re not the boss of me stage, she developed a habit of stomping off to her bedroom when life wasn’t behaving the way she thought it should. She added a touch of drama by slamming her bedroom door.

I had warned her a few times not to slam the door, but she kept doing it. As a conscientious parent, I didn’t want to slip into the “I’ve told you a thousand times not to slam the door” mould. Futile. So I tried to think of another approach.

I received feedback from friends and coworkers that I was great at thinking outside of the box. My creativity was appreciated. I understood the meaning of this phrase, but I never found it useful for creativity. I visualized being in the centre of a large box with looming sides. Trying to think outside of this visual restriction didn’t help.

I always changed the expression to “thinking of an expanded box.” Suddenly, I could visualize adding ideas to the situation under review. It was an unimportant factor whether the box got bigger or I added items to the original box. What it did was free my thinking away from the obvious. It allowed fresh air (ideas) to appear.

So, getting back to the door-slamming pattern, I came up with an option I thought would work. I gave her some control over the situation. It would reduce the risk of harping on her behaviour, and it had a high chance of success.

I had taken a step back from our locked horns to look at my responses. What was I trying to achieve? I wanted the door slamming to stop in a win-win way.

I try hard not to use limiting or dead-end thinking, such as ‘I just don’t get it.’ Or ‘how could anybody do that,’ or ‘I’ve tried everything.’

I removed her bedroom door.

I told her she could have it back when she agreed to stop the slamming.

We were both stunned into silence.

A week passed and she never mentioned the missing door or her behaviour, so I asked her if she was through slamming her door.

“No,” she replied, much to my surprise. I tried hard not to laugh or respond in any way other than a simple “ok.”

I told her I didn’t want to keep checking so when she was ready to stop with the door, to let me know.

During the 3 weeks the door was missing, we never got into any arguments about it. The door was never slammed. Our interactions were quite cordial. Peace reigned.

Then, out of the blue, she said she wouldn’t slam her door anymore. That was good enough for me, and I promptly rehung the door.

She never did slam the door again.

I read her this Blog to get her permission to tell this story. Her response – “Yup, that’s all true. That was me back then. Go ahead and post it.” Ah, family time to reminisce.

Please give this a bit of a think. Can you think of a situation where you took a step back from solving a problem? Did you try adding new ideas rather than trying to peer over the side of the box?

Please comment by sending me an email with your bit of a think. I am curious about your thoughts.

Photo by Diana Parkhouse on Unsplash

If you enjoyed The Blog, please share it with others. Thanks.

And my thanks to St. Albert’s 50+ Activity Centre for making this Blog possible.

Volunteer Blogger

glenn.walmsley@icloud.com