Perspective Shift
Yesterday we moved into a more permanent apartment after a month of hotel-apartment living. My experience in Berlin is coming after four years of living in Sicily and six in total in Italy. I've lived in eight different apartments over those years. (In my life, maybe twenty-ish different homes.) Showing up at the apartment yesterday, it was our first visit. We had seen the building and done a live online viewing, but we'd never stepped foot inside.
I'm a pretty logical thinker. And since I'm so used to moving, I like to have things all lined up. I had a list of things to ask the landlord so that we wouldn't be left without the wifi password or knowing where to leave the garbage or without an extra set of keys. Turns out my list was useless. She had everything laid out ahead of time. A binder with the instructions for the washing machine, a checklist of the exact inventory of the house (from forks to framed prints on the wall), the wifi password, and info about how to contact a cleaning service. Our name was already on the mailbox, the buzzer, and the door.
The apartment was immaculately clean and white. She asked us to look around. If we saw any "damage" in the next few days we are to take a photo and let her know. She pointed out a scratch on the coffee table and a small ding in the bathtub and wrote it down on her list. Defects, she said. Whoa, I thought.
As a tenant, looking around I saw all the things that were right in the apartment, especially after visiting so many apartments. I saw how light it was, how clean, how organized, how warm. As a landlord, she looked around and saw all the things that were wrong: a missing lightbulb, a broken wine glass, missing sheet sets for the bed. We were both looking at the same exact space, but with very different eyes.
I walked in there with all my experiences from the past: apartments with mold and broken ceiling fans, landlords who didn't care if the hot water heater was broken, houses filled with so much junk an inventory would take months, two years of living with a stuck doorbell, and having to beg agencies to please, please, please register the rental contract. She was walking in there with her experiences of tenants who left no traces, other than a scratch on the coffee table.
All of this is to say that we can face the same exact thing and see something very different. Our past experiences and our expectations all inform what is in front of us. My to-ask list, while logical, was clearly a product of me assuming and expecting her not to have things all lined up. I probably won't stop making my lists, nor will I start looking too hard for defects, but I might remind myself to let the best possible scenario play out. I will try to walk in there with fresh eyes, and if that doesn't work, I'll try someone else's view.
Changing perspective is hard, but easier to practice in small doses. Take a look around you, what do you see? What is the person next to you seeing? Today I'm wondering what assumptions you automatically bring to the table. What expectations do you have? How might things change if you let go of some of your accumulated past experiences and let what is happening just unfold? How will you make space for the best possible scenario?
As always, I would love to share a conversation with you about this or about what is on your horizon (or just what you're eating for dinner, that works too!). You can sign up here and let's talk!
Sending sunshine (or rather, please send ME some sunshine!),
Henna