Tuesday afternoon and all manner of issues are kicking off at work. I could feel the levels of annoyance rising. But then, my mind flashed me a message: “Calm down, nobody died.” I leaned back in my chair, took a swing of tea and nodded. Yep, fair point.
I’m not one for big dramas anymore. Caused by the simple process of ageing. It is a fact that as we get older, we have loads more data to work with. Meaning we will get into a flap about a lot less.
It’s a simple thing. But I often find myself getting twisted about something that’s happening. And then? A quick reframe. I say: ‘Hang on, this is not that important, not compared with bigger issues.’
While it’s true that I’m too old and knackered to care about things as much as I used to, it’s also true that I can do that because experience tells me there’s no point panicking. When I have little or no control, I see no reason to stress about it. Whatever ‘it’ is.
If I can’t change it, why am I worrying about it? That’s the way I look at life now. The ability to be easy in that manner comes with ageing. Simple as that, although it took me a while to realise.
For example, a delayed flight because of bad weather. What point would there be in yelling at the airline staff? It won’t do anything about the storm. Likewise, someone doesn’t like me? Well, I can’t make them like me. So, nothing to see here, move on.
There’s a brilliant line in the Tom Hanks movie: Bridge of Spies. Hanks plays insurance lawyer James B Donovan. Mark Rylance plays captured Soviet spy Rudolf Abel. When Donovan warns Abel about the grave danger he faces and asks if he is worried or alarmed, Abel calmly replies, ‘Would it help?’
There it is, a philosophy for life in a simple, short sentence. ‘Would it help?’ It might be a line from a movie, but I often find myself thinking it when the world is exploding around me.
There’s also the ‘helicopter view’. Professor Steve Peters describes it in his book: The Chimp Paradox. It works, I use it a lot.
When things are kicking off, you stop your first emotional reaction. Instead, you imagine getting in a helicopter and floating above the situation. Then, when you are floating above it, look down at the event from your vantage point to see both sides and test if the worry is important. After that, you can return to ground level with a calm, logical plan.
But, for any of these to feel like an approach you can take, I accept, it helps to be grey around the gills. Because life stops being about trying to impress people. And more about having a nice mug of tea and a nap.
It’s still kicking off at work. But I’ve found answers to the problems I can deal with. I’m going to make a fresh mug of tea. Nobody died.