A couple days ago I had one of those mornings that nothing seemed to be going right. My workout, that usually starts my day off right, felt laborious both mentally and physically. When I returned home, not one of the other five individuals who live there had woken up. Six if you include Wally. Meaning that we were already late and when they finally did roll out of bed it was like a symphony of chaos. Hungry chaos I might add. Milk flying, cereal boxes being fought over. When my husband and I did speak we were already yelling because we couldn't hear each other over the noise.
We all headed into our days that day on a bad note, and not to mention extremely wrinkly. On the way to school and work the news of shootings and fires and school bus crashes fueled the sparks of negativity that were just waiting to be ignited. When I dropped my 3 younger boys off at school they were punching each other as the door opened and I didn't even have the energy to reprimand them, plus they were at school now, and the head of school could deal with it.. or their dad. I understood the desire to lash out. But I don't hit, I just start punching down my worth solely based on my inept ability to get my family out the door successfully on an average Wednesday.
We believe what we tell ourselves.
As I drove to work I began creating worst case scenarios of the meeting I had to have with my boss that afternoon. Little things irritated me. The car in front of me that was going below the speed limit during the morning rush. I could feel the sharp clasp of the 20-year-old bra I have had that I refuse to get rid of despite it literally stabbing me in the back. Or the damn gas light that always seems to read empty. Or my coffee cup that has already leaked on my coat because I washed it on the bottom rack despite the instructions not to. And not to mention my phone constantly receiving phone calls from numbers I don't know. If they did know me they would know I only respond to texts.
"This day is going to suck," I told myself as it began to rain as I parked into the closest parking spot which was a mile away from my building remembering that I had left my umbrella in my office.
I sat in my spot with my face illuminated by the empty gas light and looked over at the car next to me. A woman was sitting there, talking on the phone and did not look happy. In fact, she looked mad and judging by her SUV and the school magnets stuck to it, I could only imagine one of her kids left his lunch or homework or violin at home too.
The world is in disharmony right now. Do you feel it? People are quick to point out each other's faults. Everyone needs to be right. People are looking to be offended just so they can express virtual outrage for attention. Nothing is fair. Everything is awful. Appearing to be angry seems more assertive and acceptable than being content. We are all declaring war on each other, even ourselves and there is never going to be a winner.
I turned on my Christmas playlist in an effort to exorcize this demon of a Wednesday morning out of me before I went into work. I had already decided that I wasn't going to take my lunch break today since I was late, so that allowed at least fifteen minutes to save my soul.
I put my head back on the seat and tried to climb out of this attitude that was only serving as a happiness vortex to the rest of my day.
I thought about looking at my morning from a different view. Like a movie when you see the same scene but from the view of a different character. Like when Marty sees McFly finally punch Biff. In this case, all views of our morning were heinous, so I scrapped that idea.
I imagined flying in a plane over my hometown. Even though I know all the streets, I get excited to see what it looks like from above. The cars always look like they are going slow. Even an accident, if I ever witnessed one would look like bumper cars from that view. The houses and the people all look relatively the same. You can't tell a nice car from a crappy one. Or an unemployed person from a CEO. We all just going along in what appears to be harmony. If I could see my home, what I would notice was the how it looked solid, and warm in contrast to the cold air. The abundance of having exactly what I need for survival comes into hyperfocus when you stop allowing all the disruptive negativity to cloud your view.
Sure, you may have a sick child, or a sick parent or an empty bank account. But, you also still have that child, still have that parent, and still, have that account. I may have yelled in frustration at my husband, sons, and dog but I could pull out my phone and text (most) of them and tell them I adore them and I'm sorry. I have that option because they are still here. Negativity and hate are contagious they spread like wildfire and before you realize it, you have set your entire house on fire. If I choose to, I could post on social media just how awful the world is to me, or I could post how wonderful the world has been to me. How do I want to affect my friends today? Love and peace are even more infectious.Everyone has bad days/weeks/ months. My bad day doesn't have to be your bad day or my family's bad day.
Even when things are crumbling around you, you still have to find your footing and bringing others down with you will only make it harder to climb back up. When I'm in those situations I have a select few people I can reach out to and tell them I'm at the bottom. Not to bring them down, just a call for help. They can throw me a rope so I can climb my way out. Sometimes the rope is just a text telling me that I'm capable of doing it. That's all. But wow, that positivity is powerful and in some cases all I need. If they joined in on my negativity, I might fall even deeper.
I have close friends who have lost a child, or even multiple children. The worst possible thing a person could endure. And I know that in those dark times, positivity isn't going to make a dent in their pain. They don't ask for anything and it is hard when my desire is to want to take the pain away. These are cases where you just have to sit in that pain with them. But as the years pass by there is a common thread that I have heard each of them say. They want to talk about their child. They want you to say their child's name. They want to celebrate the positive gift of that life and the short time they had with them. They don't want to focus on their child's death, they want to focus on their life.
We can learn a lot from them.
Amazingly, this decision to shift my mindset only took about five minutes. Every day is a gift, even if it appears to look like a lump of coal. I took another sip of my coffee, tied my hair back into a bun and stuffed it under the hood of my coat, added an additional layer of lipstick and walked into work knowing that I was in control of turning this day around even if my feet were wet while doing it.
