“Standing still isn’t gonna get us anywhere”

"Standing still isn't gonna get us anywhere"

Amazing

Expressing oneself; exchanging views; non-verbally communicating with each other –

as a mediator, I truly like to encourage my conversation partners to express in words, gestures, pictures whatever worries or concerns them.

The following comment by a participant in a mediation meeting has become embedded in my memory:

“Standing still isn’t gonna get us anywhere”.

Quite an amazingly, logical pun – and, admittedly, I like it very much.

Why did this sentence impress me so much?

I am interpreting it in this way:

“We’ve got to find a new common path to get things moving again, here and now.

Otherwise, we continue to be stuck, which is not going to get us anywhere.”

To me, his words sounded like the beginning of the end for frozen personal circumstances.

Stuck on the way

Originally, he and his siblings were planning to organise care and nursing for their close relative, who had fallen severely ill.

But somehow their plans became stuck on the way.

Common planning and acting turned out to be too difficult, if not impossible for all of them.

A fresh start

For this reason,

“Standstill isn’t gonna get us anywhere’, the sentence mentioned by my conversation partner, rang in my ears like signalling a fresh start: a self-determined initiative, an autonomous decision to bring impetus – in the best case with others – into a situation that is currently at a standstill.

A praise for their decision

The siblings proved their desire for change by choosing a common mediation – trusting that this would be a great and supportive way to get things moving again.

For me, this was also a truly marvellous sign of mutual recognition in challenging emotional terrain.