Circles of influence

Circles of influence

There's something called 'circles of influence', which divides your world into things you can influence, and things you can't. It helps you to focus on the things you can do something about and to stop wasting energy and time on the things you haven't got a cat in hell's chance of doing anything about. Thinking like this was a revelation to us as all of a sudden the things that had been gnawing away at us; the worry about whether their dad would relocate to the Outer Hebrides, go AWOL, loose the children on a trip, not cook the chicken properly etc were lifted because we can’t influence them! What a weight was lifted! So reduce your worries too by establishing what you can influence and what you can’t…

Q1 Write down the aspects of how their dad parents your child that you CAN influence.

Q2 Write down the aspects of how they parent that you CAN'T influence.

Q3 Now write down everything else that you worry about and then divide your worries into two piles:

Ø Things you can influence

Ø Things you can’t influence.

Keep reviewing these questions as nothing ever stands still, circles of influence shift as do your practical and emotional needs and worries.