Circle of Concern- Circle of Influence

Humankind has evolved to a level where we care about things more than ourselves. We care about the environment, we care about the world, we care about our society. We have become more empathetic towards things around us and things far from us. We start to confuse between what we can and can not control. Things we can not control does not let us sleep. We are for sure better human beings, but with care comes worry and chaos. We start to sabotage our daily life with things we can not control. We need to become proactive instead of reactive. We need a tool to understand the things we worry about and take proactive steps towards it. (To read about being proactive, go here) Such a tool is Circle of Concern-Circle of Influence.

If you see the image below. Imagine the outer circle COC, consists of all the things you care about. It might be from what people say about you (if you care), how government is not taking care of the crimes, fire in nearby building, school, office, bed sheet your husband/wife has put, shoes in the bed room, rain, heat, etc., you get the idea. Now all these things are not and can not be under your direct or indirect influence. So, we make another inner circle, COI which consists of all the things you can and do influence directly or indirectly, for example, what you eat for dinner, how you react to what people say about you, how do you spend you money, where do you want to go for vacation, and so on. When you become proactive, your inner circle increases and slowly would take over your out circle of influence. Which would literally mean that you have influence over whatever causes you care about. And the things you still could not influence will eventually move out of the circle of concern as well, like the weather. 

 Now every time you worry about something, try to map it in one of the circles. If it is in COI, take a step towards it and free your worry. This will be proactive thing to do. If it falls under your COC, think about what could you do to get it in your COI and eventually work on it. If you can't bring it in your COI, then you should just let it go and focus on more important things. When you keep doing this, you will notice, there are so many unimportant things you let yourself worry about in your daily life instead of being grateful for what you have right now. This is one of value proactive people acquire. They become more grateful, and in turn hold a more positive approach towards life. They become happier.

Let me give you a few examples to understand this even better. Look at the image above, the earthquake is something you can never actually control but, you still cannot help worry about it. A more proactive approach to get it inside your COI is that you help in relief funds for the earthquake survivors, you could build yourself a earthquake proof house. You could go help people who are in trouble due to the earthquakes in their area. If this is something you can not do for some reasons, just pray for the people and let this topic go. Remove it from your COC. Instead, be grateful for your life and safety. If you are worrying about a celebrity's rehab, trust me she/he has enough people to worry about that. Let it go. If you are worrying about the environment, stop buying plastic, help recycle, use water judiciously. If you are not happy with your manager,try to understand what he wants with his employees? A person is made with his circumstances and his decisions, so try to be empathetic and be kinder from your side. You will see his behavior will change against you. Now, this might make your colleagues jealous, but again that is something you can not control, so be empathetic and forgive. Be kind to them as well. Being proactive here will mean, help others see your manager the way you do. Help build other's COI as well. When you start watching your thoughts and replace the worries and reactive nature with proactive steps and gratefulness, life becomes easier and more fulfilling.

This is just one step, which will change your life towards a more happy work and life. You will see things changing around you. You will start seeing opportunity in all things in your COC. This in time eventually leads to a successful life.

This post was inspired by the book '7 Habits of Highly Successful People' by Stephen Covey