#1127 How to Get Perspective

Not too long ago, we hung out with my friend Tripp Lanier who helped us gain perspective via a little thought exercise that included us looking through the Hubble telescope at distant galaxies.

I love that thought exercise so much that I’ve actually made it one of my go-to Tools.

Here’s how it goes.

Feeling a little stressed and/or overwhelmed by something in life?

Try this quick perspective builder.

First, imagine launching yourself off planet Earth into space. See yourself hovering somewhere near the moon. Now look at the Earth.

Try to see yourself on that little blue ball.

Quick q: Where are you and your huge problem? Can you see yourself and that unbelievably big problem from that bigger perspective?

Now, being jumbo huge and all, pick up the Earth in your hand and fly to the sun. It’s 93 million miles away but we’re super-fast so it’ll only take us a second to zoom there.

Now, just for fun, throw the Earth into the sun. Watch it disappear.

Then ask yourself, “How many Earths can fit into the sun?”

Get this: You’d have to throw 1.3 MILLION (!) Earths into the sun to fill it up.

Do that real quick. It will only take another second. (Seriously, imagine yourself throwing the Earth into the sun. Over and over and over again. Boom. Done.)

Then…

Come back to Earth. Grab a piece of paper. Write a lower-case “i” on that piece of paper.

You see the dot in that “i”?

Well, that’s how big our (1.3 million-Earths-eating) sun is relative to the Milky Way Galaxy if it was the size of the Earth.

(Your brain blow up yet? 🤯)

Now… To continue our Nothing-that’s-happening-to-us-is-THAT-big-of-a-deal perspective building tour, let’s grab a pin. Hold it out at arm’s distance right at the darkest part of the night sky.

Imagine focusing your virtual Hubble telescope on that dark pinhead of sky. You know what you’ll see?

Thousands of galaxies.

Now…

Remind me again: How big is your problem?

One more time: From a COSMIC perspective, NOTHING (!!!) is a big deal. Period.

That’s Today’s +1.

Let’s get some perspective on whatever might be freaking us out.

Not so we can avoid it. But so we can approach it with the calm confidence of a practicing lover of wisdom as we give our best to our biggest challenges.

TODAY.