The Shopping Trip

As I have done in previous blogs, I’m going to present a challenge from the card game, “Bounce Back.” Your job is list the skills and the attitudes of resilience that you would use in dealing with the challenge. Describe how you would respond to the challenge using these skills.

This one relates to Jack and Diane taking a shopping trip to the mall. They are looking for new outfits for an upcoming event that they were invited to. They both try on several articles of clothing trying to find the perfect ensemble. By the end of trying on everything, their arms were quite full. After ringing up the items and leaving the store, Jack notices that he is still holding a pair of jeans that he forgot to get rung up. The clerk had not noticed and neither did Diane. Jack really wanted these jeans as well. It was a simple mistake, but he thought he could not just take them home.  What skills should Jack use to resolve this dilemma  Should he just head home or head back to the store and explain the situation? Should he ask for Diane’s advice?

Here are some of the skills that we think would be useful to Jack in dealing with this situation. Obviously, these are only suggestions. One size does not fit all, and everyone is different.

We would first off suggest that Jack deal with the feelings that he has about himself and the options that he has in terms of his behavior. How will he feel if he doesn’t take the item back? Will he be comfortable shopping in this store in the future? This is a situation where we think talking about it would be a good idea. We would suggest asking Diane’s advice.

If he decides to take the jeans back, we would think that giving some thought to what he would say would be a good idea. Using humor might also help.        

Dealing with a situation requires Jack to look at the values that he has as a person and as to how he sees himself and feels about himself. How he will act on his values will determine the outcome of this situation.

Talking with others about how they would deal with a similar situation or how they have dealt with a similar situation would be helpful. Again, you may come up with other skills and attitudes that you would apply in the situation. In using this game over the years, we have found that it encourages people to really think about what they would do in a specific situation and requires them to actually demonstrate how they would apply the skills and the attitudes of resilience to the challenge.