Is there a scientific reason why I don't call my water company?

[aniinl]

I would really like to get to the bottom of this.

I have a water damage in my house, downstairs next to the entrance. Somebody had a look at it once and said that it's very common in this neighbourhood and might be the water in the ground coming up (I live in the Netherlands where pretty much everything is below sealevel).
If that is indeed the reason, it could be fixed, but would come back in 3-4 years.

Then, a neighbor had a look and lifted up some boards in the ground to check the water pipes, and found them wet. This might be the problem. He said I should call the water company and have it checked. If it's their pipe, they have to fix and pay it, if it's my pipe, I have to pay it.

I'm not calling them. I don't know why but I have such a resistance, even though it's just a stupid phone call. Plus, I'm at home all day, so I could easily make an appointment without re-arranging things. I would have to speak Dutch on the phone, which I don't like, but do in other cases, too. I've had bad experience with people fixing stuff in my house, but OK, I also had good ones (though I have to think really hard which ones they were..) The two people which I mentioned above happened to be there for other reasons - I did not have to call them.

I think it's really just about making the stupid phone call. But why? I don't have a phone-phobia or anything.

I am making to do lists every day. And I love being structured and working my way through them and crossing things out. The only thing I carry over from day to day is "Call the water company!!" I am adding more and more exclamation marks to this sentence each day, but I'm just not doing it!

WHY??? What's the big deal??? The fact that I might fix it now and in 3 years again? The money that it might cost me? But maybe it's their fault and I won't have to pay anything. And who knows how much water I'm wasting by having dripping wet water pipes? I'm really into saving money, so why don't I call them?

Maybe I just need someone to report to. So this is my last attempt to get myself to do it. So I can tell you tomorrow I did it.

Still, if anyone knows how from now on I could make those phone calls (anything to do with offices or workers coming to my house) RIGHT AWAY - please let me know..

Thank you
Anja

[Clark]

Stop thinking about it, just do it. The only resistence is in your mind, not your hand Pick up the phone like you are calling a friend and doing research on who should have to pay--your friend just happens to speak Dutch and works at the water company...

Clark

[Jen Waller]

Hi Anja,

So have we got an update?

Jen

[Tomwalked]

I love the title of this thread!

BLAME SCIENCE!
I have to start using that one!

This way I can give the old... "mercury is in retrograde" excuse a rest.



as for advice or suggestions Anja... I don't really have any...
(other than check your horoscope to see if your mercury is in retrograde)
except maybe... if you had called into the show... maybe you would guess what your homework was going to be.



good luck.

[aniinl]

Nope. Didn't call yet.

But you should see my to do list. There are really many many more important things on it, (like sitting at the beach and brainstorming what more things I could put on the to do list) and I really really just don't have the time.

Ja, I was hoping to find a scientific reason that can be explained, like a call-the-watercompany-deficiency in my brain or something. I could for sure NLP it away and then get invited to the Oprah show to hold inspiring speeches and tell other fellow-sufferers how I over came it..

So, maybe tomorrow.

Anja

[Jen Waller]

lol while appearing on Oprah sounds cool, it does strike me that you're making this a lot of hard work to prioritise this

How can you make this easier? Is there a particular reason you are thinking of contacting this person via the phone rather than email or snail mail for example?

Do let us know when you choose to contact them 

Jen

[Anja]

Hi Anja,

please let me know when you will be on Oprah's show....
for when you are there you'll have managed to find a way to actually do dreaded phone calls 
and I am really eager to get some insight on how do do that.....
meanwhile have you already found out what exactly you dread would happen on the phone when you call??? Maybe thinking about that and then asking the wonderful question if you could really be sure about that the fear being true could help you to get a step closer....

Wishing you all the luck while beeing on the phone
(and expecting the time and date of the oprah show

Anja

[Jay Budzynski]

Here ask yourself these questions and see if it loses things up- or just imagine ignoring the pipes and then in a year or so you have to pay 1000s and 1000s out because you could have got something fixed before it was to late-   

1. What's the problem?
2. How do you know it's a problem?
3. When did you decide that?
4. When don't you do it now?
5. What are you deciding then?
6. How is that different from how you were?
7. How do you know that, now?
8. What other changes would you like to make?

J

[aniinl]

Wow. What a learning experience. This might all sound funny to you, and of course I'm trying to make it sound funny, but still, I've learned something about myself!

First of all, it's Friday today. Friday is not a good day to call the water company, is it?

Second of all, I noticed that making this phone call is simply not inspiring. Inspiration has been my second name since the beginning of this year, I'm concentrating on doing inspiring things and inspiring others and it looks like my subconscious is sabotaging me the moment I'm trying to do something un-inspiring! Just to keep me on track. (Thanking my subconscious and blaming it at the same time.)

Third of all, it's Michael's fault. Page 87, "You can have what you want", says: "I, Anja, commit to listening to the voice of inspiration and living an inspired life." He started it!!

So I'm sitting here at my laptop, working, and came by to check the forum and thought, no matter what they say, it's Friday, it's really not a good day to call, the water company employees will already be thinking of their weekends - I'll tell them I'll call on Monday.

But then I saw all you lovely people trying to help! And while - sorry - none of the questions worked for me (though the 1000s and 1000s left a fleeting impression..), what worked was just the fact that you were trying to help! And I just thought I can't dissappoint you! I can't let you down by not giving you a happy end! I have to help YOU!!

So. Ta-daaaa! I just called them! Took 3:55min. Including the menu, press 1 for this, 2 for that, etc...

As ridiculous as this might sound, but I noticed that I'm more driven by helping others, than by helping myself. I did this for you! I have to laugh about this myself, but I hope you semi-understand what I mean. I don't mean this in a glorifying Mother-Theresa-way at all. It's actually not even a good thing, we all know we should think of ourselves first, so we have the resources to help others. But I love learning things about myself, even if it's through tiny ridiculous things like this.

Now, this could be the end of the story. I'm glad I found reasons for all this. I need reasons. I'm pretty reasonable (when there are no water companies involved). And, after all, I can't sit on the Oprah show one day, saying, "First I didn't call for no reason, and then I did. For no reason." Where's the message in that? How am I going to help and inspire others with THAT?

But, the story continues. The water-company-person I had on the phone made a note and said someone would call me back. 5min later someone really did call me back! (Customer Service is not the Dutch's highest value...) They said it's just condensation and I should dry the pipes really well and wrap them in old news papers... To see if it comes back. Hm... Apart from this high-tech repair suggestion, how they knew it's just condensation, is beyond me. Maybe they have crystal balls.
So, the down side is, that I now have to open my floor, *touch* the pipes (it's a wet, dark hole with bare old bricks and old water pipes, it's a place where you would expect rats!!! Though of course I hope not...) and then do the same thing again in a week or so, to check again!
And if I do find them wet again, I will have to make ANOTHER PHONE CALL aaaaaaargh!!

So, I'll be in touch... 

Anja

(This will all be chapters in the best selling book, "The water company phenomenon", see Oprah's book club in 2013 and don't miss the webcasts!!)

[Jen Waller]

So let me get this right despite the fact it's Friday today and Friday is not a good day to call the water company you actually made the call and learned something new. How cool is that? I like happy endings 

You mentioned Michael's "You can have what you want" which reminded me that he talks about momentum in one of the later chapters. To paraphrase here as I haven't got the book handy, now you have the ball rolling its a lot easier to keep it moving 

Jen

[Tomwalked]

This is one of the most entertaining threads I have read here in a while...
First, Anja... thank you for trusting us enough to share these valuable insights, and your process... it *IS* very helpful to me as I continue to examine my own internal processes.

Second... you make me wish I had wet pipes...
(ok, wow... that maybe didn't come out as well as i had hoped).

third... I love that somehow, the universe is letting you *keep* learning... by needing to call the water company back!

fourth ... thank you for making me laugh again and again...
I'm one that finds a great challenge in sometimes taking myself too seriously, and you are an inspiration... in not taking yourself so seriously... and seeing where our little tricks and traps and things to laugh at ourselves about lay.

...

there's more... but, I'm gonna go check my pipes...

[aniinl]

Thanks, Tom

And if I wanna laugh out loud again, I'm just gonna read your reply over and over again, ha ha 

So let me get this right despite the fact it's Friday today and Friday is not a good day to call the water company you actually made the call and learned something new.

Jen, thanks for pointing that out! I didn't even realize that! That proves again that I'm not one to go with the majority (and by majority I mean all those people who don't call the water company on a Friday). I like to be different, take the unbeaten path, explore new ways! You know..

Anja

[Anja]

Good Mornig to all of you
and special congratulations to you Anja!

wow! I am impressed that you made that phone call on a day where there really IS a reason not to do it!! Nobody I know ever does such things on Fridays. But YOU DID :-))))
I love happy endings !!!!

This thread IS an inspiration! I really enjoyed followin this thread :-)

And I am really curios on how the hightech solution consisting of old newspaper works.... ;-)

Have a nice weekend

Anja

[Lennydw67]

Hi Anja

Glad you made the call.

I work for a utility company as a trainer.......however, many years ago when I did take calls form customers.........I used to notice that customers would leave it ages to ring the gas company if they had a problem and sometimes they would have hefty debts and would let things get in a awful state before they did in fact call........I also noticed that many customers seem to require getting themselve worked up to make that call.....and would often be annoyed, upset or angry before ringing........

As a result one of key things I found for handling a customers enquiries was changing their state during the call.......especially if you wanted to introduce a product later in the call.......but for the most part it's just an easier job and less draining if you can have fun with the customers!

[aniinl]

Hey Lenny,

I can totally see through your story telling email... 

We have something in common, I used to work in a call center, too. "Changing the customers state" is pretty much the only exciting thing you can do there, isn't it! Only I didn't know back then that I was "changing their state".

After my time there, I know I would never ever pick up the phone all worked up and angry and expect the person on the other end to want to help me.. So, we all learn from our experience. And Dale Carnegie...

Anja
(in the process of collecting newspapers and trying to determine when they can be considered "old")

[Lennydw67]

Lol i did that without even realising honest!