I have the fortunate opportunity to meet a lot of people and I am always fascinated by how some can see opportunity every day and some can’t see opportunity even when it is right under their nose.  So here is a little experiment to show you what I mean.  It will only take 40 seconds, but I promise you that it will be worth your time.

On the right, there is a short 40 second video.  PAY CLOSE ATTENTION to the players in BLACK SHIRTS and count the number of times they pass the basketball. Then come back and I’ll explain how this phenomenon plays itself out in our everyday life. DON’T CHEAT – WATCH THE VIDEO!

Pretty wild huh?  Don’t worry, I didn’t see it either.  So now, you should be asking me, “what in the world does this have to do with the ‘mortgage crisis’?”

Great question!

The basketball players in this analogy symbolize the negative information around us, and the woman with the umbrella symbolizes the opportunities that are missed everyday when we allow the negative information to influence our perception of reality. You see, my point has less to do with the “mortgage crisis” and more to do with how we perceive things when we are under stress and how that might affect our ability to see opportunity.  Here is an example of something that happened to me recently.

A few days ago, I was cleaning out my email in box and out of the corner of my eye, I saw this headline in my email from a very popular blog that read…

“9 Banks Failed in 1 day!!!!”

It immediately caught my attention and I had to check it out.  The post already garnered 84 posts in the short time that it was up so I knew it was a hot topic.  The post read…

“That’s right you read the headline correctly.  Nine Banks failed in one day.  All 9 banks failed on Friday Oct. 30th, making it the largest number of bank failures in one day in US history!”

The banks that failed are:

“That brings the total of bank failures for 2009 to a whopping 115.  How does that total compare with previous years you ask?  Well in 2008 there were 26, in 2007 there were only 3, and in 2005 & 2006 there were zero”
(statistics obtained from FDIC at http://www.fdic.gov/bank/individual/failed/banklist.html)

Here is what is funny.  My good friend and colleague Jim Gunther is an Ivy League graduate in Economics, Business and Philosophy.  He’s way smarter than I could ever hope to be.  So when I come across information to make me sound smart, I share it in hopes to “one up” him on current economic information (bad move).

I was truly alarmed and so I said to Jim, “wow, 9 banks failed on the 30th, that’s over 100 just this year!”  His response was a somewhat arrogant, “yeah, that’s actually not that many, other years have been much worse…”

I thought to myself, “Is he really that out of touch?”  I was convinced that this time he was wrong and I was going to prove it to him.  As I began to read people’s comments, I found myself trying to find proof of just how bad things really were.  My goal was clear and I was going to win!  Then it hit me.  What was I doing?!  I know that I am competitive but this is ridiculous!  I quickly got my head back in the right place and put my competitive nature in check so that I could be in an objective place.  Now I had to make sure that I didn’t fall into the negative doom and gloom comments.

I thought I was ready but I was helpless against the onslaught of negativity that followed…it was just so inviting!  Everyone making comments as to how bad things are, and sarcastic jokes on the government’s role that made me laugh and deepened my level of cynicism.  Then one person attempted to bring some perspective:

“All of the banks listed above, with the exception of Community Bank of Lemont, were owned by a single holding company, FBOP Corp., out of Oak Park, Illinois…”

Now, I’m not an expert, but did he just say that really only 2 banks failed, not 9?!  I slowly looked over to Jim to see if he had already begun his instinctual, ninja like, Millennial response to use Google in proving me wrong.  I was getting nervous and was now determined to show him just how bad things were.  Wait!  Here I go again.  What the hell is wrong with me?  Was I really trying to make a case of how bad things are just to serve my ego?

So now I was upset with myself for letting this alarmist language suck me into wasting my time with this ridiculous post.  Then I saw that there were still 79 more posts and I was curious as to what they all said.

Lo and behold, the negative comments began again.  It was as if they didn’t even see what he had written.

They went on and on, post after negative post, dramatic statement after dramatic statement.  Now I found myself doubting what the other guy said.  Maybe he was wrong?  Maybe Jim was just a little too quick to respond today, and maybe this really was a big deal.

Then, someone posted the actual numbers of bank closings from 1982-1993.  Here is what he said:

I think we do need to add some perspective to this…

Here are the bank failure rates for the period of1982 – 1993

1993 – 50
1992 – 181
1991 – 271
1990 – 382
1989 – 534
1988 – 470
1987 – 262
1986 – 204
1985 – 180
1984 – 106
1983 – 99
1982 – 119

The other thing to put it in perspective would be the failure rate for 1930.  There were 1352 bank failures that one year.

While 109 seems like a lot, it isn’t that far from the norms, especially considering the current economic climate.

We weren’t even close this year to previous years!  I was shocked! So I shared it with Jim, praying that he wouldn’t give me the “why would you ever question me…” look.  I decided to say it out loud and not look at him so as not to give him the opportunity. Well, now that the truth was out I was convinced that this kind of data would put an end to string of negative comments…wrong!

This continued for over 80 more posts!

Here are just a few…

“WOA Kitty!  We live in interesting times . . .”

“I was wondering how this compared to the bank failures of the Depression era, and how many failed in one day during those times?”

“An incredible number for a single day!  More than failed during the Depression?”

To be fair, there were a few people throughout the posts that attempted to bring some perspective and some folks even re-posted the list of bank failures listed above, but those comments just couldn’t get the same amount of attention as the erroneous bank failure implications.

So, what does this all mean?

As frustrating as this is, it is a very normal part of our everyday human function.  We are flooded with information every waking second and we have to filter out most of it, otherwise we would never be able to focus on tasks at hand.  For example, as you are reading this, there are thousands of other stimuli that you are filtering out.  The hum from your computer fan or other noises in your surroundings, items on your desk and even the color of the frame around your computer screen.  This understanding allows us to face the fact that what we perceive as “reality” may not always be “reality”.

The media and negative coworkers aren’t helping because they seem to thrive on the negative information, which only aids in shaping our reality–unless we have a strategy to combat the negative influences.

Selective attention is a very powerful force that, if you are not careful, can lead you down a path of perception that will destroy your career.

We should never underestimate the level of influence that those around us, what we read and what we see on TV have on how we see the world.  The video you watched in the beginning illustrated just how easily we can MISS information (or opportunity) even when it is right in front of us.  This is not new information for any of us.  We have all heard the advice of staying away from negative people because of the effects they have on us, but how many of us actually follow it?

This is what I want to leave you with.

This process of filtering out information is NOT a conscious one.  What I mean is that when we are doing it (filtering), we are not aware that we are doing it.  Negative people don’t see themselves as negative people because they are just reporting what they “perceive” as reality.  You can’t fault someone for reporting their reality because it is what is true to them (the implications of that are for another post at a later date).

Here is the good news.

We have more control over this that we think.  We can monitor what we read, who we listen to and who we spend our time with.  We have choices, but it takes a strong commitment to not fall into the ever so inviting trap of the  negative perception and ultimately miss (not see) the opportunities that could have a positive impact on our lives.

TIP

We have a rule at our company, and I would urge you to adopt something similar.  We don’t use alarmist, doom and gloom, or pessimistic language.  We figure there is enough of that already and it only clouds our judgment and doesn’t add value to anyone.   Language like, “well, you know, with the state of the economy and all…” and words like “crisis” are a big no no.

We also made a commitment to be open to REAL TIME feedback and stop each other when we begin to speak that way because we are all too aware of the cost that it has not only on us but more importantly on our clients and families.

This English proverb sums it up perfectly…

“Some people go through a forest and see no firewood.”

There is opportunity everywhere.  We just need to decide to seek it out.  It is true that “if you seek, you shall find” and now is the time to ask yourself, “what am I seeking?”

In the story I shared with you above, my focus on how bad things were made it very difficult to see the truth.  Just like when we focused so hard on the number of passes made by the team in black, we couldn’t see the woman with the umbrella.

If you don’t believe that there is a ton of opportunity, then I urge you to ask some of the many people finding success today what they see.  If you find yourself wanting to prove them wrong or arguing with them, that might be a clue as to what the problem may be.  Even worse, if you don’t know anyone who is finding success today, you might want to assess the people you spend your time with as I will assure you that they will impact how you think and how successful you will be.

I hope this has opened your eyes just a bit to just how influence-able our reality really is.

Rene

Tagged as: brain, culture