Today is December 13 and the Navigate the Chaos question to consider is “How often do you remind yourself that you are the decisive element?”
People who navigate the chaos understand that they are responsible for creating the climate of their life.
German writer and statesman Johann Wolfgang von Goethe noted “I have come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element. It is my personal approach that creates the climate. It is my daily mood that makes the weather. I possess tremendous power to make life miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration, I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal. In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis is escalated or de-escalated, and a person is humanized or de-humanized.”
Sometimes people have to hit rock bottom to understand they are the decisive element. Actor Tom Hardy is one example.
Hardy came to the harsh realization he was the decisive element in his life when he got expelled from boarding school, developed an alcohol and drug abuse problem as a teenager, and was once arrested for stealing a car and gun possession.
He developed an alcohol and drug abuse problem as a teenager, periodically spent nights in jail for disorderly conduct and was once arrested for stealing a car and gun possession. He avoided prison, he says, only because his companion and co-conspirator was the son of a British diplomat.
He finally checked himself into rehab and cleaned himself up in 2003 after, he says, he collapsed on Soho's Old Compton Street.
As Hardy said in a 2012 interview "I was a lot naughty. I hit a brick wall of behaviour. There were the options of institution, death, prison or insanity, and I could tick the boxes on three of those so I was very lucky that I had a moment of clarity. Something happened and I did something so heinous that I saw myself and I didn't want to be that person. So from that moment on I ceased to be that person and started to grow towards the person I wanted to be. I never want to go back to that again. It's craziness."
Hardy decided he was the decisive element. Do you? What’s holding you back from believing you are the decisive element?