Keep Shaking the Bushes

A little boy and his family, had just moved into a new home and this child went out to explore their property. In the back yard was a bush. Upon this bush was some berries. The little boy was too small to reach the berries, so he started shaking the bushes to cause them to fall off. It was early spring and of course, the berries were not ripe. What berries did fall to the ground didn't taste good at all.

As the spring turned into summer, every once in awhile, this child would shake the bushes and taste the berries that fell to the ground, to see if they tasted good. He would "shake and test" and "shake and test" as the summer went on.

In late summer, the berries were finally ripe enough to taste real good and plenty would fall to the ground for this child to eat.

As we go through life and we try to accomplish any of life goals and try to solve the problems we face, we just have to keep trying (shaking the bushes) until we solve our problems.

Another way to solve problems is to "think outside of the box." This just means, that the solution can sometimes be found when trying something that is outside of standard problem solving procedures.

A good illustration of this, was shown in a situation with an electric utility company that was facing a serious problem after an ice storm, with ice on the power lines. The ice on the power lines was causing the lines to break, resulting in power outages. The CEO of this company had all the employees meet in the large auditorium for a brainstorming session to try to find the solution.

Ideas came thick and fast from these employees. Then one of the new office girls stood up and said: "Why don't we fly the company helicopter over the wires." Everybody laughed at that idea. But later on, when the managers were going over all the suggestions offered, they suddenly realized that the helicopter idea was sure worth trying.

The next day, the helicopter pilot flew the helicopter a few feet over the power lines and the down draft, from the blades, wiggled the wires and the ice fell off.

This goes to show, that everything is easy, once you know how. It doesn't matter whether it is a health problem, a business problem or whatever. We can solve anything, do anything, once we know how.