The power of story

Something happened to me that made me realise there are many ways I can tell the story.

When I change the narrative of a story, it changes my whole feeling about the situation.  

So, in the simplest terms, I was out riding my horse and a dog ran at us, she turned for home and ran. I fell off just before arriving home, landing on the road. 

These are the very bare details of what happened, from my perspective. It's very easy though to tell the narrative of this story in different ways.  

For example, I can blame the other people involved... I was out for a quiet ride minding my own business when out of nowhere, an out-of-control dog ran at me, scaring my horse, who reacted in the only way she knew how, running  away, I ended up falling off on the road.  

The owner of the dog should have been much more in control of it, it's downright dangerous to let your dog scare horses and endanger horse riders.  

There's also the lens through which I blame myself... I was an idiot on Sunday, I took my horse out and I really shouldn’t have, a dog scared her and she ran away. I should be able to control my own horse, I’ve been riding long enough. 

Then to top it all off I wasn’t even capable of staying on and I fell off on the road, I’m such a useless rider. 

Neither of these feel good though, I’ve blamed the man with the dog when he was just minding his own business and didn’t know there was going to be a horse rider around.  

I’ve also blamed myself, I have poured shame on my choices, as if I should have or even could have made different choices. I mean sure, next time I could make different choices, but I can only say that now with the benefit of hindsight. To say I should have made those choices before is to just unnecessarily criticise myself.  

Its really tempting when something happens to us to put a negative spin on the situation or to blame external factors, but it doesn’t ever make us feel good to do this.  

When we can see everyone as just doing their best including ourselves then we are quicker to be kinder about mistakes and can learn and move on to the next lesson in life. 

So I choose to tell a different story, I say... I fell off my horse at the weekend, she was spooked by a dog and ran away. I'm very grateful that although I fell off, I managed to land pretty gently on the tarmac and walk away with a small scratch. Next time I’ll read the situation more carefully, for now I have experienced this, I know more than I did before.  

What stories have you been telling where you blame yourself and others for events that happened?  

How can you be kinder and more compassionate to yourself and others when things go wrong?