Lessons on Leadership from the Little Things in Life: Everybody Has a Lens

Life is full of examples that teach us lessons. When we see or hear or experience something from which we can learn, it is that example and experience that often helps us remember the lesson. That’s why stories and illustrations make learning so much more effective. When a story can be used to illustrate or demonstrate a valuable lesson, the story makes it much more understandable, relatable, and memorable. And so I am sharing examples of circumstances and stories that I have experienced in my everyday life, which illustrate leadership lessons that we can learn and apply. This is one of those stories, and it’s a great reminder that everyone has a filter through which they see things. 

I often share stories and comments from my grandchildren, because their words and actions tend to be unfiltered and innocent, and so they provide a great perspective on a view of the world through their innocent eyes. This is another one of those examples. My daughter had been playing in her bedroom, and when she came out of the room after a while, she warned us not to take too long to start playing when the little one asked us to play. She proceeded to tell us that she while she was in the room, she did not respond quickly enough to an invitation to play with a particular toy. My granddaughter then stated dejectedly, but quietly,  in her self-talk voice, “My momma doesn’t like me.” 

Now, of course, her mama does love her and like her, but in that moment, a little girl had a lens that was affecting her perception of the circumstances. Her three-year-old mind was equating playing together with a belief about someone’s care. Therefore, through that lens, she was interpreting a slow response to play as an indication of how much her mom liked her. Of course, a few minutes later, that was all forgotten as they played with a different toy, but it still provides a great illustration for you and me.

People all have their own lenses. As adults, those are lenses that have been formed over time based on past experiences and interactions. As those lenses are shaped, they then affect perceptions of present experiences and interactions. In the process, new interactions and experiences either affirm, modify, or disprove that perception. Knowing that this is true should make you consider three important things:

1. You have a lens. You have a filter through which you perceive, understand, and interpret things. It stands to reason, then, that how you perceive, understand, and interpret things is affected by your particular filter. You need to be aware of that. You need to be able to recognize the lens that you have and how it got there, so that you have a better understanding of how and why you are viewing things the way that you are.
2. Everybody else has a lens. For the same reason and in the same way as you, they have a filter, but theirs will be different than yours, because they have had different experiences and formation. It may be a vastly different lens, it may be very similar, or it may be somewhere in between, but it will be different. 
3. Therefore, you cannot necessarily expect others to see things the same way as you, especially if there is a lack of communication and dialogue. This underscores the necessity of actively listening to understand someone else’s lens and clearly communicating in a way that helps to minimize misunderstandings and conflicts that come from having different lenses.

That’s the lesson on leadership from this little thing in life, from my granddaughter making a comment of whether or not someone liked her based on how quickly they responded to her invitation to play. We all have a lens, a filter, behind how we see and interpret the world around us. But so does everybody else. We need to recognize that we have that filter, and we need to accept that everyone else does as well. Then we need to learn how to build cooperation and understanding in spite of it. Because everybody has a lens.