Imagine a force pausing the entire world, except you, for 30 minutes. Every person is in freeze frame, nature is on hold and not a soul is trying to reach you by cell, voicemail or e-mail. Take a deep breath.

Now take a good look around your immediate surroundings — or micro-community — be it at work, home, the neighborhood store, or wherever else you are right now. How are you affecting this micro-community? Do you know? Just like George Bailey in It’s a Wonderful Life, whether intentionally or not, you’re leaving a mark or impression on every being with whom you come into contact, in every community in which you participate. Do you know whether your effect on this community leaves it better or worse?

Choose to take it personally

Truly understanding that each of us affects others through our interactions is one of the first steps toward more skillful intra- and inter-personal communication. However, the proof is in the action. What step precedes every single action we take? The choice or intention to act in a certain way. And what element helps inform the choices we make? Our beliefs; in this case, our belief (or not) in personal responsibility for our actions and the consequences of those actions.

An everyday example
Let's say you don’t believe it’s your responsibility to move out of the way when you’re one of four people walking abreast on the sidewalk so as to block the way for others. You probably won't move, meaning that the the persons coming towards you or looking to move past you have to move out of your way. How does this action affect your micro-community at this point in time? Negatively, though you may not experience the effect immediately, unless another person shares your belief in lack of personal responsibility, and fails to move out of your way, despite being one person swimming upstream against a four-person ‘wall.’ The result? People — and belief systems — collide.

While a simple example, it’s one many of us find familiar. Consider the benefits of choosing to have a more positive effect on your micro-community:

• Less stress—you’re no longer frustrated, or frustrating others, and frustration manifests itself mentally as stress and physically as illness.

• Improved health—knowing that you’re making a daily contribution to your micro-communities in a way that helps you and others feel better.

• Broader learning capacity—you’re open to more ideas and alternative perspectives.

• Improved communities—thanks to fewer belief-system (and actual) collissions. You're making each of your micro-communities better places to be, which can be a reward for you and others. You reap what you sow.

• Positive role modeling—whether intentionally or not, you’re serving as a more positive model for other people.

• Better communication—leading to fewer misunderstandings and stronger relationships.

Ready to start making a positive effect on a conscious level?

Quick tips for becoming more aware of your effect

Ask: Survey colleagues, friends and family about how they experience you in the respective micro-community. The key here is to be open to their feedback. Without an honest interest in feedback, this tip will backfire on you because you’ll react to the comment and most likely be negative!

Reflect: Reserve and take the time required to examine how you regularly act in your micro-communities, assessing which traits need refinement and which ones allow you to affect the community positively. Remember that others often experience us as we are, rather than as we'd like to believe we are. You might describe yourself as a nice guy, but what might others think: the woman to whom you were curt, the fellow you almost ran down in the pedestrian crosswalk, or the person whose coffee spilled when you bumped impatiently by her without apology (or perhaps even knowledge) in the coffee shop? Some people refer to this as the ‘eulogy tip’: If you die tomorrow, what would people really say about you in a eulogy?

Assess: Access a wide spectrum of personality and emotional measures to determine where your strengths lie, and where certain traits, on a bad day, can hinder your relationships and effect on your world. The Enneagram is one such tool to acqaint you with The Shadow Side that others might experience more often than you think! The great thing is that even simple knowledge of our potential shadow begins to affect our behavior for the better. Awareness can have amazing results!

Observe: Who has affected you positively, and how? What can you learn from these persons? What’s the best way to incorporate those actions into your repertoire of responses, decisions and interactions?

Act: All of this information and new-found awareness means nothing unless it affects your thinking and your behavior. Regardless of where you are now, start slowly: take a nice deep breath (don't worry, it only takes a few seconds!) and intend to have a positive effect on everyone and everything you come into contact with for the next hour. Now how hard can that be?

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