Ignoring The Obvious

What Messages Are You Ignoring?

Could it be something that someone is telling you?  Perhaps that nagging pile of mail on your counter?  The email folder with hundreds of unread messages? Or is it an important message being drown out by the sea of unwanted messages pummeling your senses.

Some messages are worth ignoring.  For me, I have been purging and unsubscribing to email lists that I find myself consistently deleting without reading.  I tell myself I will save this for later when I will read it, but  I really know I won't.  So I don't deal with it.  And it piles up and festers, like a wound that won't heal. That distraction may take my attention from the email that is important. In this case, ignoring should be replaced with eliminating those unwanted messages.

Obvious Messages

Some messages are important to not ignore and are obvious.  The stop sign, an intersection traffic light or the school crossing sign are definitely messages that you should not ignore.  The consequences of error are too high.  They are there, out in the open. But distraction from the cell phone message or the radio commercial may make those obvious messages invisible to you. 

Others can be right in front of our eyes, such as helping us to be safe.  We ignore them, not because we choose to, but because they have become invisible in the sea of messages that bombard us all the time.

Not-Obvious Messages

Other serious messages are not so obvious.  The flashes of light in our eye that tells us we may have the start of a retinal detachment, or the message in a number that tells us our blood pressure is too high. Or the rattle we hear when hiking in the desert, just off the trail. These messages may be subtle and should not be ignored.  The consequences of ignoring these messages are also very serious. We have to be sure that we concentrate our attention on these messages.  They are too easy to miss.

Managing Messages

The important skill we need to develop in our life is to determine what messages we should pay attention to and watch for ... and which ones we can, and should, ignore.  We can't respond to everything, so we need to develop the skill of triaging messages. That allows us to deal with the messages that are important.

That skill will give us the ability to pay attention to the obvious and significant messages in our lives and help us avoid disaster. And it will give us the ability to eliminate the messages in our lives ... that are merely distractions.

What significant messages are you missing?

What insignificant messages are distracting you?

What could it mean to your life if you miss an important message?