“What the caterpillar calls the end, the rest of the world calls a butterfly” - Lao-tzu.
People with a bad attitude are easy to spot. The ones who are always negative, no matter what. Hopefully they were given some rose-tinted glasses for Christmas.
But what about the rest of us? Like most things in life, I believe that attitude is a spectrum. And most of us could work to push ourselves a little bit closer to the positive end of the spectrum.
I started thinking about this when I was at a wedding in the weekend. It was the best! Not because it was the best venue or had the best food or the best dress or the best cars, but because the bride & groom were relaxed and ready to have a great time. They were more focused on having the best day of their lives than on the table settings. They let any minor glitches pass by, so that they could keep on having fun. It wasn’t because their wedding was easier than the next one, or that they’re naturally relaxed, or any other reason. They chose to have fun and to focus on what mattered – a great day surrounded by the people they chose to share it with.
I noticed their brilliant attitudes even more than I normally would because I’d spent a few days before the wedding with the opposite personality. Someone who finds it much easier to see what’s wrong than what’s right in the world. One of those people who worries about things that aren’t worth thinking about at all. It was exhausting!
No matter what is going on around us, it’s up to us to choose how to respond. Does it really matter that we have to take a couple of days of sick? Or are we lucky that it’s just a bad cold and we get the chance to rest and recover? Is losing our job the end of the world, or is it a temporary setback that will ultimately help us to do something we’ve been wanting to do all along? Is it a big problem that you locked yourself out of the house, or is it a little bit funny?
One of life’s greatest skills is learning to put things in perspective. When you feel like you can’t cope with whatever has come your way, stop and ask yourself if it will still matter in a year. Will you even remember this moment? Most of the time the answer is no. We get so caught up being stressed that we lose all sense of reason.
There’ll still be hard times. There’ll be weeks when you’re overtired and struggle to cope. Months when your workload is absurd. Entire years when your children refuse to sleep through the night. Bills that keep coming…… So remind yourself that these hassles are temporary. Life goes on. It might even become better than it was before.
Because wouldn’t the world be dull if caterpillars gave up as soon as they became butterflies?
