THREE WAYS TO PUNCH LIFE IN THE FACE
Life, it seems, is filled with little indignities — those small, daily events that, in the grand scheme of things mean very little, but in the moment, can send your blood pressure through the roof, get your panties in a proverbial wad, and really ruin your day. I used to feel these very deeply (and some days, still do). I had a co-worker, Coby, who used to say to me, “Now, don’t get all bunched up” when he could see it coming. There are keys, I’ve found, to not getting all bunched up. Three that really help. Three that help me navigate mid-life and it’s collected indignities:
1: Go to bed — seriously, it’s that simple. Go to bed. Go to bed when the indignities start, go to bed early, go to bed often. See, trying to change the flow of the day or change your mood when these things are happening is almost impossible, it’s like standing at the bottom of a hill and trying to stop a run-away car. There’s just too much momentum. So, instead of continuing on with a day that is going shitty, trying to change it, as soon as you can — end it. Go to bed start over. In the night, as your body and mind rest, things will reset themselves. You can wake up the next morning with a new intention for a new day. In your sleep, the momentum disipated. Now, when and if things start to go wrong, you’re at the top of the hill — the car will be much easier to stop. Alos, man, sleep is just great. Get a good pillow, a good blanket, a good mattress if you can. Sleep is one of my favorite thing. And, hey, this isn’t hiding. This isn’t sticking your head in the sand — it’s hitting the reset button. It’s going to your corner and getting that little water bottle thingee squirted in your mouth so you can come out swinging again.
2: Chunking — What’s that old saying about the best way to eat an elephant? One bite at a time? There’s some deep wisdom there, I believe. Usually when life is blowing up, it’s because we’re busy. Too busy. Or people are putting demands on our time. Our plates are too full. So, what do you do? How do you handle it? We have a 5 year old — so, our house gets messy a lot. Cleaning is a big part of our day. If you look at all the mess at once, it can be overwhelming. It can be too much. So, what I do, is I work in sections. I start i one corner and say, “I’m gonna get this corner done first.” That corner is usually cleaned up pretty easily — and cleaning it created momentum for the next area. This is chunking — breaking your to-do down in to chunks, then dealing with the chunks one at a time. This is a great way to stay sane in the face of a big to-do list, I find.
3: Work on what’s in front of you — Okay, so you have a lot to do, and you’re ready to try chunking — but where do you start? It’s easy to get paralyzed by indecision. What’s the best first move? How do you begin? Well, ask yourself: “What’s in front of me?” “In front of” can be interpreted a lot of different ways, like, what is literally right in front of me, which is the most important thing on my to-do list, or what was the straw that broke the camels back and made me start feeling anxious. You get to decide what “in front of” means, sometimes, but just doing the “next” thing is sometimes the best way to get moving. I’m doing some schoolish course work right now. Some training. It comes with a lot of homework. Sometimes there is a lot to do. The ways I decide what to work on is by asking, what’s the priority. And by that I mean, what’s the next thing on the list that’s going to produce a result. Results are great for motivating you. When you see stuff getting done, you’re often compelled to keep going.
So, there you go: three strategies for punching life in the face. And let’s be honest, life has one of those faces that, some days, is begging for punching. But, I think it’s important to mention — if you punch life in the face enough, he’ll kind of settle down. He’ll stop needing to be punched so much. The result of getting a handle on your problems is that you start attracting less of them. The fewer problems, the less bunching. The less bunching, the less need for punching. A worthy goal if ever there was one.
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