A blog about leadership: It's impossible to choose your attitude

It is not possible to choose his position when there is a whole lot going wrong at work all the time

This story begins with a young roofer who shows up for work early in the morning. Cold rain planes down from gray clouds. The roofer would love to be in a completely different place, but he has a task to perform. As the icy raindrops cut into his cheeks, he turns his grinning face up at the clouds: 'Is that all you have to offer? Spit it out!'

The roofer understood that the 'choice' was his. By 'choice' is meant that you yourself are responsible for the way you react in relation to what life offers you on your way. No one else can choose for you. 'You have to choose where you want to be as soon as you get up in the morning,' says Bear, one of the fishmongers at Pike Place Fish. 'I make a conscious choice every day.'

Capture in an uncomfortable situation

We often feel like prisoners in an uncomfortable or stressful situation and our reaction shows it: 'I can not do for it! I look like my father! ' 'When will management stop exposing us to all these changes?' It is easy to justify our behavior, by blaming someone else, or by pretending it all matters to others. But our position does not work in a vacuum. When you CHOOSE YOUR ATTITUDE from moment to moment, it affects not only yourself but also everyone else you come in contact with. Behavior, promoting or inhibiting, spreads like a virus through offices, schools, and homes.

Choose a HAPPY attitude

Some have mentioned to us that they would like to reformulate SELECT YOUR ATTITUDE to 'Choose a Happy Attitude'. These are the ones who want to use FISH! as a mood-lifter to the employees they do not seem to make the right attitude choices. Of course, the behavior that stands in the way of good customer service and drains colleagues must be taken care of. But FISH! is not about everyone just having to put on the same, happy, professional smile. FISH! simply suggesting that you make your own choice and not try to throw the monkey on top of something else or someone else. When you realize that you are solely responsible for your attitude, then you achieve amazing strength. Once you have clarified that you are the only one who can CHOOSE YOUR ATTITUDE right now, then you can decide if you want to keep it, learn from it, adjust to it, and perhaps choose a more satisfying attitude.

Freezing for safety

Think of the little kids who just decide to be squeamish. No matter what is going on around them, they are dissatisfied. Then suddenly they decide to be silly. And suddenly they can not suppress a smile and everything becomes a game. Your choice determines everything. If you try to spot the worst, you will find it everywhere. If you try to spot the best, then you see opportunities you never imagined.

It is simply a choice

There is a lot we humans are not able to control - the weather, other people, economic downturn, management decisions. The only thing we can control is our own response to these and other challenges. Sometimes we have to turn to change. Sometimes we accept. Fishmonger Justin says, 'It's simply a choice.' But to live it every day, in any situation, requires something extra. 'It needs to be recreated every day.'

Written by Michael Meinhardt, LEADERS WAREHOUSE.