Most of you know that I gave up anger for Lent (No, I'm not Catholic. I just like the practice of Lent). It was great. It wasnt until about 10 days ago that anger came back into my life. Anger doesn't really want to visit me. Anger wants to take up residence. It's a battle at times.
I have to remind myself often that whatever I'm angry about really doesn't matter in the big scheme of life and most probably, I couldn't tell you what I was angry about a week later. I rarely direct my anger at whoever has made me angry. I redirect it to some unsuspecting soul who probably thinks I've lost my mind.
Three decades ago I worked for the owner of The Greensheet, Helen Gordon. She was a formidable woman. She gave me a chance to be in management and I'll forever be grateful to her. She was stern. She wore ultra suede suits every day of the year with 3 inch heels. I worked for her 5 years and she wore a wig every day. She smoked Parliament cigarettes and used a cigarette holder. She believed in giving people a chance...her philosophy was, sink or swim, show me what you can do. It was a great way for me to learn.
Anyway, we handled 100's of phone calls a day. Most had been on hold for awhile so they werent always friendly when we got to them. I remember one day Helen told me this story. She said there was a man who was always receiving the anger of other people. She said to think of them as little red tickets. Every day this man took more red tickets. He would stuff them down and keep going.
But one day, he just couldn't take it anymore. He had taken too many red tickets. And that was the day someone made the mistake of giving him one more red ticket. And THAT person got all the red tickets he had been taking for so long.
This is why we shouldnt just take other people's red tickets. Because some day we are going to throw those red tickets out. Maybe, just maybe, what we should do is just refuse to take all those red tickets from other people. Maybe if we could do that, we wouldnt have all those red tickets stuffed deep inside.
I heard Maya Angelou today say this, "Just remember, child, you arent in this." If you aren't in it, let their anger just roll off you and keep rolling.
What do you think?
copyrighted 2014
caryn cannatella
www.caryncann2.com/
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