I have a gnat flying around my office today. The darn thing is driving me crazy. It keeps flying in front of my head as I try to use my computer. Every time I grab something off of my desk that could couple as a deadly weapon, it flies out of my sight. It either moves enough that I cannot get it in my focus or blends into the background. I have made several swipes at it even while I type out this first paragraph. It has been to no avail, but I swear I will kill that crazy bug before I get to the end of this article.

It’s funny how little things can become such a big deal. It happens all the time in business. Little annoyances can become our fixation and all we can think about is getting rid of it one way or the other. We think that getting rid of the "gnat” will solve all of our problems, when, in reality, focusing on the gnat is actually taking us off of our game. You spend so much time thinking about how to rid yourself of the little problem that you don’t see larger problems.

A few years ago, a farmer had purchased an ostrich and was transporting it in a cargo van across the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. It was during the afternoon rush hour. In the course of driving, he had to make a quick stop and then sped up. The jolt sent the bird crashing out the back of the van and onto the bridge. He had a big problem. So did all the San Franciscans trying to get home that day. A full grown ostrich can weigh over 300 lbs and run up to 50 mph. The Golden Gate ostrich went running across the lanes, causing drivers to hit the brakes and swerve. Until the six-foot bird was corralled, the bridge had to be closed¹. Now one ostrich on the bridge demands a lot of attention. Ten thousand gnats flying across the bridge do not. Gnats may make for messy windshields, but they do not stop traffic. Do you recognize this as common sense? Then why do we allow the annoying "gnats” of our life to take up so much time and energy as if they were actually ostriches?

The problem is one of identifying proportional perspective. And perspective is all too often missing from our lives today. Part of that is a hyper-sensitivity to anything that smacks of any kind of judgment. But the reality is, when I make a distinction between the gnat and the ostrich, I have made a judgment. Trying to satisfy anyone who might be offended by a comment, action or even a distinction between two differing problems can be labeled as insensitive… and we have a society that is usurping common sense for being sensitive. Do you think I am kidding? A couple of years ago in Indianapolis, there was a bank robbery and a pregnant teller was shot as the assailants left the bank. She subsequently lost her babies (she was pregnant with twins.) In making a public statement, Sheriff Frank Anderson made a terse comment intended for the bank robbers, saying that they would be "tracked down like dogs” and that his department would not rest until "we find you and put you in a cage where you belong!²” But the line of questioning Sheriff Anderson received after his statement had nothing to do with the bank robbery, the wounded bank teller or the death of her babies. The questions were all about his insensitive language toward dogs. Did he believe in the mistreatment of animals? Would he actually track down a dog to do it harm? In the midst of a savage crime investigation, the sheriff took time to prepare and read a second statement, telling all dog lovers that he had nothing against the canine species and that he was just using a metaphor, but apologizing if he offended anyone or their dog. (By the way, one of the robbers turned himself in shortly after hearing Sheriff Anderson’s statement on television and told the police who the other robbers were. He believed the lawman was serious about hunting him down.) This is the kind of reasoning that has us treating gnats like ostriches.

I would like to make a simple statement. Not all problems have the same proportion. Focus on the big stuff, eliminate the little stuff. While writing this, I figured out the reason the gnat keeps hanging around my desk. I ate a banana just prior to sitting down to write this article. I put the peel in my trash can next to my desk. The gnat was attracted to the banana peel, so I took out the trash. Guess what? No more gnat! Problem solved. Now if I could just get past the ostrich that keeps pecking on the door, I can move on with this day.

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1. Escaped ostrich leads to a gaggle of tourists on Golden Gate Bridge. Steve Rubenstein, San Francisco Chronicle August 30, 2005