You turn on your shower and the hot water isn’t working.
What’s your first line of response?
Do you open the shower wall to access the pipes to the shower?
Of course not. That would be messy, expensive, and unlikely to address the cause of the problem.
The first step—even before you call the plumber—is to check the boiler.
- Is the boiler heating up?
- If the boiler is hot, is it leaking?
- If it’s hot and not leaking, then the issue is likely with the mechanism that pumps the water up the pipes.
Seek the Source
No matter how well you maintain things, how proactive you are, things break down. This happens in every area of life: your house, your relationships, your business, your body, your communications.
The skill of solving problems is therefore a good skill to develop.
And here’s where most people go wrong: they focus on solving the problem at the site of the problem.
Your lack of hot water is the presenting problem — it’s the problem on the surface. But it’s actually the effect, or symptom, of a deeper issue.
Whatever you find in the boiler room is the actual problem to solve.
Effective, sustainable solutions don’t come from solving the problem at the surface level. They can only be found by solving the problem at the source.
The key to solving problems effectively is to seek the source of the problem.
Address the cause, not the symptom.
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