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Navigating Urgency: How to Slow Down So You Can Spot and Avoid Red Flags
If you want what you want when you want it, you’re not likely to be able to delay gratification. This often happens when you have a sense of urgency. This was particularly true for me when it came to relationships. When you have that feeling of urgency, you typically ignore the consequences of plowing forward.
This is how we miss red flags.
I suppose “miss” red flags isn’t really accurate. It’s more like we ignore or plow over red flags. When I look back at my behavior before recovery, I think of myself as having ignored festivals of red flags, not just one or two! Now, I try to look for green flags. I wasn’t even aware that green flags existed before recovery.
Most of us think of red flags as pertaining to dating partners. But red flags can pop up in all sorts of circumstances. And even if we’ve been in recovery for a while, we can still miss them. When we do, we can look at that as info, not ammo (information to learn from, not ammunition to beat yourself up with). That is, be curious about why you ignored that red flag. When you do that, you’re less likely to do that again when you analyze what that was about.
Here’s a non-relationship red flag situation I missed. When I found a camper van to rent for my 6-week solo road trip, I was so excited…
