Little things become as big as we magnify them

Carlin once said that he didn’t have pet peeves, he had major psychotic fucking hatreds. 

Who among us cannot relate to that? 

Everyone has two or three gnawing little things that can bother us beyond all proportion. Things that make our patience wear thinner than a pole dancer’s thong. 

And it’s okay. These infuriating moments are part of the package of being human. In fact, it’s actually quite cathartic to sit in a circle of friends and take turns sharing our respective meltdown experiences. We realize that we are not alone in our frustration. 

It reminds me of a passage from a confronting but inspiring book about addiction recovery. 

Little things become as big as we magnify them. They become dragons that devour us and chase us from place to place. We them attack us as enemies. But they are manifestations of us. When it bothers us, it is just us bothering ourselves. 

The ironic thing is, this realization is, itself, annoying. But that’s the whole point. It reminds us that when our perceptions are so irritated by what we immediately encounter, we never wait around long enough to discover anything. 

And so, part of our growth is the daily practice of ignoring small annoyances. The ability to take a spot inventory of the things that are bothering us. 

Because if we can remember that every irritating fault in another person probably has a long history behind it, and if we can communicate to each other from a place of love and not irritation, then we will develop enough compassion to not kill each other. 

May we be smarter about what is bothering us. With patience, we will transcend all the annoying things life is known for. 

LET ME ASK YA THIS…

Is it really people who bother me, or the judgment you make about them that does?

* * * *

Scott Ginsberg

That Guy with the Nametag

Author. Speaker. Strategist. Inventor. Filmmaker. Publisher. Songwriter.  

[email protected]

www.nametagscott.com

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