"A Job Passed On Is a Job Well Done!"

I had a long meeting cancelled on me the other day. I was on my way to it travelling in busy traffic and suddenly I got a call. I managed to accept the call safely and proceeded to hear that something had come up and the meeting would need to be postponed. I know for most people, getting most the way to a meeting and then having it cancelled, might cause some internal consternation. I was certainly a little taken-aback. What now?

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Instantly I felt a sense of relief that I had not been the one to let someone down; others had let me down. How good that felt was quite indescribable. The person on the other end of the line was very apologetic and I felt a sense of ease return in them when I accepted the postponement gracefully. I even thought, “Cool, I have a couple of hours freed up to do other things.”

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Most of life is a supplier-customer arrangement. When we are the supplier, we are expected to deliver whatever people’s expectations of us are. When we’re the customer, we’re in the privileged position to receive. When I’m the supplier I always want to supply on time, and on ‘budget,’ i.e. meet expectations. When you’re the customer and you’re let down, it’s your supplier who’ll be feeling down. You’ve done your bit; you can relax.

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Some people get their ‘knickers in a knot’ because things are cancelled on them, or people let them down. I’m suggesting it can bring enormous peace to know it wasn’t us who let someone down; it makes it so much easier to accept a disappointment gracefully when we understand and apply this concept.

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It’s also about applying the concept of simplicity in life -- Wow, how refreshing is simplicity? When you’ve got the chance to fairly address something like ‘pass on’ or delegate a job or task, or if you simply need to get out of the way, how easy is that?

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Copyright © 2008, Steven John Wickham. All Rights Reserved Worldwide.