It\u2019s not discrimination
\nand it\u2019s not some gender game
\nThe reason they\u2019re not listening
\ngoes by a different name<\/p>\n
The group mind will advance, you see
\none step each time at best
\nSo YOUR mind will outpace them
\njust as if they\u2019re still at rest<\/p>\n
You plan for all contingencies
\nyou think in future tense
\nAnticipating outcomes
\nbased on what transpires hence<\/p>\n
You\u2019re seeing things around the bend
\nand two, three steps ahead
\nYour words float through their ears like air
\nas if they\u2019re never said<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not that they\u2019re not listening
\nIt\u2019s that they cannot hear
\nVibrations from a different plane
\nthough spoken, disappear<\/p>\n
And when they finally do catch up
\nto where you\u2019ve long since been
\nThe credit goes to he who shouts
\n\u201cLook here at this new thing!\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s really nothing personal
\nyou could be guy or girl
\nYou\u2019re just a three step thinker
\nin a single stepper world!<\/p>\n
\u201cDo you think it\u2019s because I\u2019m a woman?\u201d she asked curiously.<\/p>\n
It was several years ago, and a friend and I were having lunch at the now defunct Tropical Blendz restaurant on Middle Road here on Saipan. She wanted my opinion of a situation she was dealing with at work.<\/p>\n
\u201cSometimes we\u2019ll be in meetings,\u201d she explained, \u201cand I\u2019ll say something or make an observation, or give a suggestion, and it\u2019s like no one hears me. Then, 20 minutes later, someone else makes the same suggestion that I made, and that person gets all the credit! It\u2019s frustrating! What do you think is going on?\u201d<\/p>\n
I told her I sometimes have the same experience. It sometimes makes me question whether I actually said the thing out loud, or perhaps maybe I had only thought it to myself. I have to restrain myself, because I feel like shouting, \u201cI just told you, people, the same thing 20 minutes ago!!\u201d<\/p>\n
My lunch partner is a very intelligent, forward-thinking woman. I know she\u2019s a possibility thinker, can visualize cause-and-effect relationships, and is an excellent communicator. I suggested to her that what might actually be happening had nothing to do with what others thought about her, but actually how she thought; in other words, the way she thinks.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s possible that what\u2019s happening,\u201d I told her, \u201cis that you\u2019re operating on a whole different level that they simply can\u2019t fathom, and that\u2019s not visible or audible to their senses. You\u2019re anticipating what needs to be done two or three steps ahead, while they\u2019re still grappling with step one.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s like being in a game of chess in which you\u2019re three moves ahead of the other player. You\u2019re already seeing what the board will look like in the future, and your comments and suggestions are based on that future reality. Meanwhile, the people you\u2019re speaking with can only see what\u2019s right in front of them at that moment.<\/p>\n
So, your words\u2014words that don\u2019t fit into their present-moment reality\u2014simply don\u2019t register as meaningful. In fact, they may not be hearing them at all! They may be like gibberish, background noise, sounds and ideas vibrating at a frequency and coming from a dimension that\u2019s way beyond the range of the other person\u2019s senses at that moment. The people in your meeting will never see what you see until they take a few steps forward. Then, when the \u201cgroup mind\u201d is just one step away, they\u2019ll be able to see what you\u2019ve been able to visualize all along.<\/p>\n
So, yes, it could, in fact, be a woman thing, but from what I know about you, it\u2019s probably simply that you\u2019re a three-step thinker in a single stepper world!<\/p>\n
The solution? (a) Accept it as your lot in life. (b) Escape the single-stepper world, and find other three-step thinkers to associate with!<\/p>\n
(Walt F.J. Goodridge, Special to the Saipan Tribune)<\/strong> It\u2019s not discrimination and it\u2019s not some gender game The reason they\u2019re not listening goes…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[3712],"class_list":["post-302350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinion","tag-walt-goodridge"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=302350"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302350\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=302350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=302350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=302350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nWalt Goodridge is author of over 24 books, and conducts writer workshops to help others pursue their writer passions! Learn more at http:\/\/www.saipanwriters.com.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"