Carlene Young said, "Zander’s The Art of Possibility has been a wonderful, breath of fresh air in our long, arduous year of studies. I have already recommended it to several people and am inspired by it again and again. In Chapter 10 he states:

“If I cannot be present without resistance to the way things are and act effectively, if I feel myself to be wronged, a loser, or a victim, I will tell myself that some assumption I have made is the source of my difficulty” (p. 143).

I am reminded that life is not fair, it’s the way things are. If I find myself in conflict and feel put out, or like a victim, I just need to turn the tables and say, “OK, what am I assuming? Is that the problem?” If I am assuming that every teacher in my school has as much passion and desire to have their students learn the arts as I do, I’m sure that’s false, no matter how much I wish it. I have to back up and see the whole board, and enjoy my dealings with all of the teachers and their classes. They aren’t all as supportive as I wish, but I can deal with that and enjoy those classes in a different way.

I replied, "Sometimes when we are so passionate about something, it is so difficult to see why others don't get it. Feeling that the louder we exclaim your belief, the better chance they will have of believing us. The fire inside that a passion for something creates is hard to quench, unless we are finally beaten down and the fire just goes out altogether. I guess the question is: How can we redirect that passion in a way that is supportive of those who might not necessarily see things the same way we do? In theory we know that we are supposed to look for the positive, but sometimes, the emotions those passions bring to the surface, override and logical or reasonable thought."