Endless Playback

A mentor of mine, Scott, once shared with me how he tries to keep from grumbling as he goes through life. In his early 60’s and yet to really come into the digital age, Scott says he imagines his mind as a kind of reel-to-reel tape recorder, with his thoughts and conversations with God and others making up his personal tape collection.

Scott allows himself to play the tapes only twice in his mind; after that, he commits to mentally erasing the negative reels – those containing his grumblings – and instead tries to find better material to archive.

I like Scott’s analogy, though I confess my reel-to-reel can be far too often on endless playback.