Whenever someone tries to share a word of wisdom, attitude hack or a trick to achieve something, our first reaction tends to be,’ Yea, yea, I know, I know.’
However, it’s just like Harv Eker brilliantly said at one of his seminars ‘If you don’t do it, you don’t know it’. Recently I learned a valuable lesson about my reaction to something to which I would have generally said, ‘I know, I know’.
My first TOTAL FAILURE that day
Since none of our kids were spared by the annual wave of sickness that often happens in autumn, we spent the whole day cooped up indoors. I had set a goal for the day that, no matter what, I would get the house looking spotless by the end of the day, and I spent every spare moment working towards my noble goal. I admit it was a pretty extreme goal considering I was home with three sick kids, but you know me, it’s go big or go home. And since I was already home, the only option was to go big 😀
After our home restaurant finished serving lunch, I went to the 1st floor to get our little princess to sleep while the boys stayed downstairs to work on their coloring and workbooks.
However, it was one of those days when our youngest family member refused to go down for her beauty sleep. Hence, the whole process took me way longer than usual, and let’s be honest, it was a COMPLETE FAILURE. An hour later (when I woke up myself:)), our Sleeping Beauty was nowhere near to being true to her name and, instead, was running around the room with a grin that was a mile long. It was clear that dreamland would be a guest short today.
I threw in the towel with a slight sigh and returned downstairs to try again a little bit later. I could hear joyful cheering from the boys and feel a little wave of anxiety washing over me. What are they up to this time!? As I reached closer, I saw that my sixth sense did not fail me.
You would not believe what our living room looked like.
It was as if I had stepped into a Winter Wonderland when I reached the living room. The entire room was covered in white. The floor was full of toys, and the carpet and the couch were all under a ‘snowy blanket.’ My two little troublemakers were running around with a bag of flour, covering every inch of the place.
If you think the dinner table, windows, and kitchen were spared, I’m afraid I will disappoint you. The snow elves had even managed to ‘make it snow’ in the hallway, bathroom, and utility room. It was as if that bag contained 10 times more flour than it could fit.
Now, you would think that the ‘snowfall’ came to a screeching halt once they saw mom but again, you’d be sadly mistaken. Instead, it encouraged our male versions of Elsa to work even harder, and the entire downstairs was getting whiter by the minute. I was frozen in place…no pun intended, and just completely lost for words as I watched the avalanche take over my house.
Their little sister was thrilled at sight and ran full speed to enjoy the Winter Wonderland that her brothers had created. If I am being honest, I did think to myself earlier that I shouldn’t take a break from organizing the dry goods, but when your options are an organized pantry or hungry kids and their bedtimes…well, you can do the math.
How did I lose control over my attitude?
Only one person in our family was not thrilled about the snowy winter surprise. Can you guess who that might have been? If your guess is the annoyed mother who had spent all morning cleaning and planned on using that last bag of flour to make pancakes for dinner, then ding, ding, ding – you’re a winner. I can’t even tell what annoyed me the most, the fact that all of my morning cleanings were for nothing, the unexpected ‘extra project’ or the failed idea for dinner.
In any case, there was now an angry Snow Queen in this winter fairy tale who made the snow elves line up, grab a snow shovel, and get to cleaning. It was clear from my tone of voice that this was not a polite request. You could see the disappointment reflecting on their little faces; ‘Why??? It’s so much fun!!!’. They weren’t happy but surrendered to the evil queen and started gathering up the ‘snow.’
The best attitude hack I’ve learned from our nanny.
I had to leave home early the following day, and I could hear the nanny laughing as she stepped into the hallway. Glad that someone is in a good mood at 6.30 in the morning. As I greeted her, I realized that she was laughing at the mirror doors on our wardrobe in the hallway because they were still decorated by snowy white handprints – the evidence of yesterday’s snow fest. ‘What’s happened here?’ she asked cheerfully.
Looking back on it, I couldn’t help but laugh myself.
Isn’t it strange how a situation that got you so mad when it happened can seem funny when you look back on it?
Why not apply that sense of humor to the situation from the start? I’m well aware of this attitude hack that 10% of our attitude is made up of what happens to us, and 90% is how we react to it.
Easy in theory, but using those attitude hacks it in practice is something I need to work on. Isn’t it wonderful to have three loveable teachers constantly providing opportunities to improve your reaction skills? Again, it might not feel so wonderful when they’re playing ‘How high can it go?’ with your blood pressure, but at the end of the day, you wouldn’t change it for the world.
I’m thankful to my children for this lesson and our nanny, who put things in perspective.
With Love,
Annika
P.S. If you got at least one idea out of this post, share this article with at least one other person who could also benefit from reading this. Everybody loves a boost of positivity! Thanks and talk to you soon:)
