Fish!

After watching the short film about the Fish! philosophy, a management and atmosphere technique used a Seattle fish market, I thought a lot about how people's attitudes can influence your own. The film introduced some concepts to improving their work atmosphere that can be translated to other situations. They stressed the importance to have fun, make the effort to make peoples’ days, the importance of being personal with others and, the one I found the most interesting, choosing the your outlook on the day and your behavior that stems from that decision.

A lot of behaviors are highly contagious, such as smiling. When you see someone genuinely smiling walking or sitting in class, you can almost feel your mood change from grouchy from the unjustified scheduling of the class at 8 am to a more open minded cheerful disposition. The key to “Choose Your Attitude”, in my opinion, is the word genuine. In order to affect those around you with the flash of your wonderful smile you truly need to feel good and happy which can be hard for people; No one is overly moved by a forced half-smile. You can decide that you are going to be happy but if you don’t truly commit to that decision and the attitude you want to bring to the world, it becomes very tough.

I really enjoyed the activity of literally throwing away the troubles that are bothering you that 311 did earlier this week. I’ve tried to take that idea on when sitting down to work on homework or before walking into my job. It’s symbolic but powerful and I can see a difference in my behavior and also how it has affect those around me.

             The whole video reminded me of a quote by Ralph Waldo Trine. It goes: 

“To get up each morning with the resolve to be happy is to set our own conditions to the events of each day. To do this is to condition circumstances instead of being conditioned by them.”