Life Is What You Make It

I have been thinking about the idea of life is what you make it. I know we often talk about being in control or taking control of your life or doing what you love or anything of the sort, but how often do we really do any of these things? How often do we actually take control of our life instead of reacting to the stimuli constantly occurring around us? How often do we head in the direction we want, instead of following the path the winds are blowing us towards?

Some things are out of our control and it is important to make the best out of what happens around us (and to us). You may lose a job or a relationship will end or a manuscript will be rejected or you will be passed over for a promotion or any number of bad things that can happen to you. Don't dwell on the bad things when they happen. We've all heard the sayings: "there's more than one fish in the sea" or "when a door closes a window opens" or "everything happens for a reason". While we all know these are true, we have to do whatever we can to really make the best out of things that happen.

There are times, though, when you just can't make the best out of what happens. Instead of falling into an abyss of depression, sometimes you just have to shake your fist (often with your middle finger extended) to the heavens and use the anger as the fuel to learn as much as you can, pick yourself up and move forward. Not everything is going to work out in the end. That's perfectly normal and okay, no matter how many people mention a cute, little quote like the ones above. Sometimes shit just happens and we have to continue to get up in the morning and live life. We don't have to make the best out of these situations, but we do have to keep moving forward doing the best we can.

It would be great if someone could just give us a shortcut on making life exactly what we want it to be. We look around and we see people who seemingly are living the life they want and we just want to know how to get there. The real answer and the one most people don't want to hear is they worked their ass off. Yes, they may have had some lucky breaks along the way, but they still worked their assess off. I know, it's not the answer I wanted either. I was hoping for an easy way too...but everything you really want is going to take a lot of hard work. There really aren't any shortcuts on this journey, unless you don't really care about the outcome.

As you are trying to make your life what you want, remember no one really has all the answers. If they act like they do (or actually think they do), they are going to do more harm than good. You can read tons of books or listen to people speak or subscribe to all the self-help blogs and podcasts out here, but you are never going to find all the answers externally. Part of life being what you make it is knowing what you want with your life. Other people have their own agendas and ideas that probably don't mesh with yours. The only way to get all the "answers" from other people is to give up your own ideas. No matter how you spin it, this sounds a little too cultish to me (and trust me from experience, no matter how smart or well-known a leader is, they aren't going to be right about everything).

This life is what you make it. The good, the bad, the happy, the sad, the anger, the joy...everything rolled into one. While we are never going to have control over everything that happens, we do have control over ourselves. We can react to the things that happen and we can work towards the things we want to happen. We can fight. We can get angry. We can work our asses off. We can get lucky from time to time. We can have things ripped from our grasp. We can try to make the best of the shitty things that happen. We can just dust ourselves off and push forward when the really shitty things happen. We can curse the gods. We can thank the heavens. We can learn and dream and hope and pray. We just can't stop trying.

Try Something Else

We take everything way too seriously. As a whole, we spend too much time stressed out about things that really don't matter. We look for meaning in every little piece of data we can find, failing to see that some things just happen. We try to control the world around us without realizing the only thing we have any control over is ourself (and sometimes even that is doubtful). By only reacting to the things happening around us, we never really live.

For most of us, we just need to let go and let whatever happens, happen. The "bad" things that could happen are usually not as bad as we think they will be and the "good" things we hope for are usually not as good as we imagine. Realizing we have little control of the world around us, we can instead focus on ourselves and how we interact with this world. We can work on how we react to the stimuli around us. We can really decide who we want to be, instead of trying to be the person we think everyone wants us to be.

This isn't easy. I don't even know if I am a good person to even talk about it as I haven't come close to perfecting it in my own life, but it needs to be said. We create a crazy world by spending so much time worried about what other people are doing or thinking. We create a world where bullying is the norm because we criticize differences instead of celebrating them. We create a world full of violence and hate because we are more worried about who are neighbor prays to than we are about how we act. We create a world full of difficulty because we take our thoughts and ideas so seriously we can't believe anyone would think something different.

We are all different people with different thoughts and experiences. This has led us to different beliefs and thoughts about what is important. These differences should be celebrated instead of feared. Instead of distrusting your neighbor because they are different, spend time getting to know and laughing with them. Instead of thinking everyone else is wrong, realize more than one person can be right. What is right for you may not be right for others. We are born, live our life and then die. Every one of us has this in common. We can't control everything that happens during the course of our life, but we can control how we look at each day and how we react to the things that do happen. Smile more. Laugh more. Stop taking things so seriously. Trust each other and help build a better, safer and more peaceful world.

It won't be easy and it may not make this world any better, but what we are doing now sure isn't working. Maybe it is time to try something else?

Relax

For many of us, frustration is a part of our daily lives. We become frustrated when things don't work well, when people don't do what we expect or even for no apparent reason. Frustration will often pop in to our day without warning, but once it hits, we are no longer able to do our best work.

Frustration saps our creativity and our drive to produce. For many, once frustration sets in, we become more and more frustrated. It shows up and we become surly and have a really hard time breaking out of the funk. Once we are in the funk, it becomes nearly impossible to do the work needing to be done until we can get our minds back on track. Frustration only leads to more frustration until we force ourselves to step back, take some deep breathes and relax. 

The problem is most of us become easily frustrated over stupid things and aren't able to easily to get out of the funk. Society has taught us to keep pushing forward, but sometimes the frustration is your body and mind telling you to take a break. We have to step away and break the hold the frustration has on us. This isn't always easy at work because many of our jobs are stuck in the factory mindset. We show up at a certain time, have prescheduled breaks and have to be doing work, come hell or high water, during the scheduled times. Because we aren't able to step away when we need to, instead of learning to eliminate frustration when it hits, we learn to keep doing things when our mind and body scream to stop.

This isn't always a bad thing, but until we learn to eliminate the frustrations as they hit, we are never going to be able to produce our best work. The mindset we have on the job often bleeds into the time we spend outside of work. We become accustomed to being frustrated and we see it around us all the time. The angry people in the store or road rage or neighbors yelling at each other. We feel it too, when the TV goes out during a show or the dogs aren't listening or people are being "stupid" or someone doesn't understand what we need.

We have to get better at listening to what our mind and body are telling us. Frustration shouldn't control who we are and what we do. It's difficult to remind yourself to take a step back once frustration hits, but this is the best thing you can do. Going through life angry and frustrated isn't good for you or anyone around you. The best thing we can do is learn to see the frustration and then learn to relax once it takes hold. Your going to feel better and the work you produce is going to much better. 

Difficult Conversations

In this age of technological innovation, I think most of us have forgotten how to and fear having difficult conversations. We can see this in our professional and personal lives. We resort to text messages and e-mails when we should be having face to face or phone conversations. We find it easier to get everything down in writing because an actual conversation is much harder to do when emotions are involved. This is a prime example of doing something because it is easier, not because it is better.

For many of us, when we think about having a difficult conversation, our stomach drops and our imagination runs wild. We picture the worst happening during the conversation and our fear holds us back from doing what is right. Instead of talking to the person responsible, we may shoot off an e-mail or bitch and moan to a friend or co-worker about what we think is right and what the other person did that is wrong. We don't have the entire story because we are too afraid to discuss it with the other person (or people) involved.

This is a terrible way to treat any relationship. We let things fester and continue to bother us to the point where we can't control our emotions about the situation. We convince ourselves that we are right and work to get other people to think we are too. In most cases, we could have solved the issue with the person involved, but instead have built up so much emotional baggage we can no longer see any other side to the story besides our own. This can cause schisms in teams and will ruin relationships.

A difficult conversation will involve emotions, but the only way to effectively have them is by keeping these emotions in check. We can talk about how something made us feel, but we need to do this from neutral footing. Going on the attack is not helpful and will only make the other person become defensive and more entrenched in their view. Most of the time, there really isn't a "right" or "wrong" solution...there are many shades of gray. We may not have liked what happened, but not liking something doesn't automatically make it wrong.

In any situation we find upsetting, we always assume the other person had the same information we did and chose a different path. While this may be true, often it is not. We owe it to the other person to find out why they did what they did before we jump to judgment. By having a conversation instead of firing off an e-mail, we can get the whole story before making a decision. Being constantly frustrated by others is no way to go through life. Just dealing with it is also no way to go through life. If we constantly ignore the issues instead of speaking to people about them, we allow the frustration to build up until we burst. Yes, many times we need to deal with the fallout from the things that happened, but before becoming frustrated, we owe it to ourselves and other people to get all the facts.

We can't do this via e-mail, at least not easily. Pick up the phone, schedule a meeting, do anything to have the difficult conversation. It won't be easy, but once you start having these conversations instead of letting technology muddle the issue, you will find it becomes easier and easier to have them. Don't let your imagination run rampant and stop feeling as if people are doing things just to spite you. By giving the other person a chance, both can walk away from the conversation with a different perspective and usually a better understanding. It won't always work, but by having the conversation, you have done the best you can do.

As I have found through most of my life, the easiest way to do something is rarely the best.

Mountains out of Molehills

Many times, we allow ourselves to make things bigger than they really are. Yes, we are going to do things that suck. Yes, things are going to happen that make life much more difficult while we fix them. Yes, things are going to go wrong. Yes, things are going to be difficult. Yes, things are not always going to be rainbows and unicorns.

But, if we take a second to pause and breath deeply, can we honestly look at anything happening and say this is really the end of the world? Are things ever as bad as we make them out to be? Instead of complaining or floundering or dreading or fearing or worrying or thinking about how hard something is, what if we just rolled up our sleeves and got to work? What would happen if we just went about fixing things that needed to be fixed, without throwing in all the above fear and loathing?

I'm not saying that we shouldn't feel the emotions we feel when everything explodes in our face, but if we acknowledge them and then get to work, our lives will become a lot easier. Five years from now, these problems, the ones that are so horrible now, are going to be nothing more than a small blip on our timeline. When we let things get to us, we aren't able to do our best work and we spend more time complaining when we should be creating. No one does their best work when they are frustrated or angry or upset or afraid.

Things are really never as bad as we make them out to be. Figure out what needs to be done and do it. Leave the emotions out of it until it is time to celebrate. People love to say "everything happens for a reason." I don't know if this this true, but believing it does make the bad things seem a lot more manageable.

Roll With the Punches

Life is all about rolling with the punches.

We can have the best plans laid out when something unthinkable happens and we have to change them. This happens nearly every day for most of us because there are always going to be things happening that we didn't expect or couldn't even imagine. Some of us become frustrated or angry when things aren't happening the way we plan. Others don't allow these unexpected occurrences to ruin their day and instead, they take them in stride.

The more important something is to us, the more likely we will get frustrated or angry if it doesn't work the way we planned. This is the time we really need to focus on rolling with the punches and figuring out how to do it in spite of the roadblock or changing it to follow the new path laid in front of us. Becoming angry or frustrated may be our first gut reaction, but neither of these brings anything good to the situation. Frustration doesn't help solve problems. Becoming angry won't change the way things are. We are not capable of thinking clearly when we are frustrated or angry. Let go and just keep on moving.

The most positive people around us are the ones who know how to take things in stride and keep on moving. They don't like what happens all the time, but they know they can't change things by being angry or frustrated. They know what they want and keep moving forward no matter what happens. What they want will change over time based on what happens and they don't stick with their old goals when new goals present themselves. Because they are not allowing frustration and anger to take over their lives and minds, they are more likely to see the doors opening when other close.

The next time you start to become angry or frustrated with something that happens, stop and ask yourself if those feelings are helping you in any way. When you realize they are not, slow down and figure out the new direction to go. This won't always be easy and you are never going to be perfect. You will become better at it and it will begin to become instinctual. A happier and more productive life is waiting...