Category: Calming The Mind

Driving home the other night, I got stuck behind a car that had its hazard lights on.

There wasn’t anything evidently wrong with the car, the driver probably just parked it on the side of the road to run inside their (or someone else’s) house, do something quickly, and put the hazards on so they didn’t get a ticket.

…Understandable enough and something I’ve certainly done before.

It didn’t, however, stop me from feeling a quick rush of frustration as I waited for several cars to pass in the opposing lane… delaying my journey home by an appalling 10-ish seconds.

…Here’s the crazy part though.

Just as I was passing the car, about 10-ish seconds down the road in front of me, a cat BOLTED across the street.

Like, unhesitatingly from behind a car, completely unseeable from the road until it was already in the road, full blown sprint… kind of bolted across the street.

And it was an instant reminder from the universe that sometimes… things happen for a reason.

And sometimes… you just need to chill the heck out and trust it.

I found out today (October 14) that both of my websites: MoveMe Quotes and My Blog were infected with Malware.

And not just a little bit of malware… but, 3,000 compromised files worth of malware.

This is not even two weeks after my websites were down for other reasons I shared.

And I’m frustrated.

And I have anxiety about all of the content that’s at risk that could be lost.

And, maybe worst of all, I feel helpless. 

…When it rains, it pours, eh?

But, I’ve done all that I can do. My web developers are on it. I have an appointment set up with a specialist on Monday (October 16). And all I can do now is wait.

Maybe you’ve found yourself in a similar situation recently. One where there was plenty to worry about, but nothing more that could be done about it.

And while we could allow the frustration to flourish, the anxiety to continue to brew, and the helplessness to continue to fester in our minds…

…What these situations could also be are opportunities to practice letting go.

And practice filling ourselves up with gratitude that we have something (someone) worth feeling this way about. And meditate on ways we can better prepare ourselves moving forward—because this sure won’t be the last time something like this happens, eh?

And to be clear, this isn’t empty “positive thinking” and this isn’t head-in-the-sand avoidance.

…This is how we flex our resiliency muscles.

…This is how we keep moving forward in life rather than mentally dragging ourselves to an intolerable standstill.

…This, my friends, is Grade-A strategy.

If I sit and stare at a blank page, thinking and conjuring up what I might write, even if I don’t write a single word, I consider it a tremendous success.

Where most people see a waste of time, what I see is a chunk of time dedicated to thinking and conjuring things up. Something that, by definition, takes time and undisrupted focus.

Something that, you must understand, looks precisely like sitting and staring.

Something that, in today’s world, is becoming increasingly rare because it’s uncomfortable and can be instantly avoided with a few taps of the fingers.

But for someone to lean into that uncomfortable feeling… to have the discipline to not submit to passive entertainment… to be proactive enough to silence notifications, close all tabs, and clear the calendar of appointments… all so that they can have some space and time to think… so that they can digest all of the crap that has ceaselessly entered their mind from the second they woke up that morning (not including the backlog of crap from the many mornings prior)… so that they can just settle and move towards clarity… is nothing short of a victory.

And to do so for an hour, several hours, or even half an hour… should be seen as one and nothing less.

Just as a car that accelerates faster from 0 to 60 needs to be proportionally better at braking back down from 60 to 0…

So, too, do we need to be better at slowing ourselves down in proportion to the speed at which our world insists we increase our pace to.

Going fast(er) without the ability to come back down is as dangerous in humans as it is in cars.

When you learn to relax inside tense moments with other people, you allow yourself to notice things you’d otherwise miss.

Things like ulterior motives (what’s the real driver behind the actions), underlying beliefs (what’s being said that’s usually being protected by formality), hidden character traits (what’s different in people’s actions when tension is present)—all while keeping a heightened sense of awareness of the environment you’re in.

Letting tension tense you up is a mistake.

When you find yourself in a tense environment, practice relaxing by slowing your breathing, dropping your shoulders, relaxing your facial muscles and tongue, and pausing before responding—right to the point where the silence is starting to feel awkward.

Then, respond with clarity; respond with patience; respond with a more complete understanding of the situation—respond with a relaxed confidence that the best leaders and speakers do when inside some of the most tense moments fathomable.

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P.s. What To Do When The “Weight Of The World” Is On Your Shoulders.