Relax… and let your brain create the solution

by Raymond Lemke, CSP

There is nothing like a problem to divide the positive people from the negative ones. The problem looms up like the Continental Divide, a great watershed, where you'll find the negative people milling around in the deepest valley. You'll find the positive people on the other side, already having scaled the mountain.

When the problem, or mountain, looks pretty big, negative people try to justify their attitudes - all their preconceived notions about why the problem shouldn't be tackled. And, of course, as they speak their justifications aloud, the input into their mental computers merely serves to validate the negative attitudes they already hold.

On the other hand, highly functioning, positive people look beyond the problems and see several possible solutions.

Of course, that's not to say that very positive people ignore problems. In fact, typically they're quite good at sizing up the nature and dimension of a problem. But their minds automatically leap to working out the necessary solution. They actually comprehend a problem in terms of its solution.

Highly functioning people do not necessarily solve problems immediately. But the very positive person, whose mental images portray him overcoming difficulties, knows how to relax and allow the subconscious mind to take over problem solving.

You've seen the mind handle small problems inexactly this way. For example, you've probably had the experience of drawing a complete blank when you try to think of a certain person's name. You think: "Oh, gee. I know that name. Just a minute. Leave me alone. Just let me relax and it will come to me." And it is when you back off and relax that the name will come to you.

Permit your mental computer to solve more difficult problems in precisely the same way. It may take two weeks or two months for your mind to arrive at a conclusion. You may be taking a shower or you may wake up in the middle of the night. The answer you unsuccessfully sought when you consciously pondered the problem will eventually come to you in a relaxed moment - provided you have maintained a positive attitude.

Once you start complimenting your own mind for being an extremely effective problem-solver, it will learn to love solving problems for you. Emotionally, it will embrace an attitude of deriving pleasure from solutions.

Solution oriented people love solving problems even more than they love solutions. "Being at the top of the mountain, or at the top of anything is not particularly interesting, but the process of getting there is," says champion mountain climber Gwen Moffat.

Brainstorming is a particularly good technique for generating solutions when members of a group share responsibility for the issue. It eliminates or reverses negative input while generating a great deal of positive, solution oriented input into our mental computers' evaluating mechanism. Brainstorming is an ideal technique for the workplace.

The ground rules for brainstorming are quite simple. Within a short period of time, usually 15 minutes, the group produces as many ideas or solutions as possible. Far out ideas are encouraged, as they may trigger other ideas for someone else. Criticism or evaluation of the ideas is suspended until after the brainstorming session is completed. Then ideas can be evaluated, combined, discarded and ranked.

If the problem is "this is broken," solutions such as "try some glue," "Maybe we should call a plumber," and even "let's throw it at the wall and see if it starts working again," constitute effective brainstorming and are equally useful input toward triggering an effective solution.

Comments like "you're the one who broke it" and "maybe the boss won't notice if we don't say anything" serve on solution oriented purpose and may indeed provoke negative images that interfere with the mind's natural ability to work through to a solution.

Like individuals, groups of people who must work together can train themselves to become solution oriented. There is no room for justification or negative attitudes when the peer group values solutions.

BECOME CONSCIOUS OF HOW YOU CHOOSE TO SOLVE YOUR PROBLEMS!