As the myth goes, the ostrich buries it’s head the sand when one of it’s predators is near, with the mistaken belief that if it can’t see the predator then the predator won’t see the ostrich. Animal experts have put us all right on this, and apparently it’s not really the case (it is more likely trying to further bury its egg) but it reminds me of something that we all do from time to time.
If we have a problem, sometimes it’s easier to pretend it’s not there, and bury our head in the sand too. We think if we just don’t give it air time we can get on with our lives and forget all about it.
If only!
As much as we might try to ignore it, it’s there in the back of our minds and it comes back out in the wee small hours for us to fret about.
The problem with not facing the problem is that we don’t know how big it really is until we do. While our head is in the sand, we imagine that beast to be huge and something to be really scared of.
If we generalise about anything we make it bigger so the trick is to get really specific. Facing up to the problem and working out exactly how bad it is often helps us establish it’s actually not as bad as we thought (when we were sand covered and trying to ignore it).
So next time you’re laid awake in the night worrying about something you haven’t dealt with, remember it’s time to face it and take a small step towards sorting it out. You’ll feel better for it, sleep better for it, and chances are you’ll realise it’s easier to sort out than you expected.
Good news all round :)