I bought my first new computer in 6 years, a few weeks ago. As I interrogated the Apple sales guy about data migration, software updates, cloud configurations, privacy settings and the like, I could feel my anxiety increase as I began to gird myself for the inevitable bumps and bruises that accompany a computer upgrade.

Even though I consider myself to be a sophisticated computer user, I headed home with a good deal of trepidation and concern about getting the machine up and running. I remembered my own experiences with upgrades and have watched my corporate clients struggle with what seemed like no-brainer computer conversions only to find out that that the little laptop can be no friend when building a new relationship. Lost data, failed software upgrades, corrupted files, and unlocatable passwords could just be in my future for the next week, running back and forth to the Genius Bar.

This upgrade will require all of my own resilience skills, I told myself.

OK, wrong again.

Thankfully, technology advances at least in terms of new retail computer set ups have customers coming first. The data migration was smooth, software automatically upgraded, my password manager converted, and the new cables all worked. My one and only follow-up was a phone call to Microsoft about Office 365 and they took over my machine and had it up and running in 15 minutes.

The resilience lesson here was about getting out of the way and letting other things lead.

I can certainly sometimes be my own worst enemy, creating problems where none exist. My memories of the past tainted my thinking about the present and created angst about the future.

Consider what upcoming experience you are worried about that might be based on some past and perhaps outdated memory. Your concerns could be warranted but then again, perhaps not. Sometimes the easiest way to mitigate our challenges is to just let go of them.

© Richard Citrin, All rights reserved, 2018

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