A New Form Of Spring Cleaning Giving Your Attitude An Overhaul By Sue Dickinson
Spring is here and the time when many people throw open their windows and start cleaning their homes, exercising their bodies, and reevaluating their careers. While ‘Spring Cleaning” often reminds us of women on the prairie beating their quilts on a clothesline with a broom handle and scrubbing their floors on their hands and knees with nothing more than a small brush, we “modern women” haven’t lost the urge to make things new and fresh in our lives when Spring rears it’s head.
This year, I’m kind of forced to make some changes to my home, as in a few short months our new baby girl will arrive and kick me out of my home office, but other life decisions are kind of taking a back burner right now.
Still, there’s an urge to change I’ve been noticing lately, and have come to realize there’s a part of my life that could really use a spring overhaul – my attitude needs adjustment, and now might be just the time to tackle it!
Now don’t get me wrong – I’m no perpetual grump – in fact people who meet me often tell me I’m extremely cheerful. I do have a habit of seeing the good in a situation, and am normally very happy with my lot in life.
But my attitude towards myselfcan sometimes be downright nasty. I can instantly sympathize with a friend who doesn’t feel well, or is tired from a long, hard week. If I, however, am tired and cranky from working all day, getting supper ready for my family and hauling my 6 month pregnant body around, do I understand and give myself a break? No Way! Instead, I engage in terribly negative self talk, chastise myself for what Idon’t do, and convince myself that I should be able to do more.
While I may be going out on a limb admitting this, I suspect that I’m not alone with this attitude problem. Do you treat yourself with the same respect and compassion that you do your family and friends? If not, maybe we should all resolve this spring to give our attitudes towardsourselvesan overhaul!
But why do we act this way, and what can we do? Here are five suggestions:
1. Keep reasonable expectations for yourself.We strive for excellence in everything we do. That is our nature and it’s great that we are never satisfied with the status quo. But, for women especially, there is often a fuzzy line between the desire to be our best and the expectation that we should be perfect. One is achievable; the other is exasperatingly impossible. Michael J. Fox explained it well:“I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence, I can reach for; perfection is God’s business.” Our self-attitude will be much more agreeable when we keep ourselves from expecting perfection.
2. Make the Right Choice (or at least a choice you can live with).Sondra Anice Barnes has said:“it is so hard when I have to, and so easy when I want to.” How many times do we go about a task with the attitude that it “has” to get done, when in reality we ourselves are imposing that requirement? So much of life is a choice. If we can keep in mind that what we are doing we are doing of our own volition, the attitude we often have that the world is “out to get us” just may melt away like a popsicle on a warm spring afternoon…
3. Curb the Green Eyed Monster.Last week, my husband was able to attend a four-day conference on marketing and promotion. He came home each night full of excitement for what he’d learned and anticipation for using the information. I found myself feeling jealous that while he was there expanding his mind and his experience (not to mention talking to a bunch of interesting people), I was working at my usual job and taking care of my five-year-old son. Not that I dislike my job or my son – in fact they are both an all-important part of my life! But the thought that my husband was learning something while I was stuck with the same old stuff really got to me.
Around the same time I read an article that suggested that rather than let jealousy take control, it would be better use all the energy it takes to be jealous to make a change in your own life. What a concept! We all know how a jealous fit can wear us out and make us feel terrible. If we can turn something with that much power around and use the energy for good…okay, this is starting to sound a little superhero like, but really... imagine everything we could do!
4. Love the Life You Have. This is always a tough one, because it is our nature to always be striving for more. I believe 100% in self improvement, but also know that it is easy to look at our goal and find dissatisfaction in where we are now. If you are hoping to buy a new home someday, it’s easy to look around the one you live in and see nothing but the bursting closets and the faded linoleum. It’s easy to forget the backyard where you’ve enjoyed wonderful conversations with friends and family or the cozy bedroom where you love to read in bed. While it’s important to keep working toward a goal that’s important to you, by remembering the good in your lifehereandnow, your self-attitude will be prepared to do what needs to be done to achieve your goals.
5. Believe in Yourself.Things don’t always go right. Sometimes our best laid plans go awry. We expect the time to work on an important project, and catch a cold that sends us to bed. We work hard all year for the big bonus only to find out that upper management has capped salaries again. We try our best to raise obedient, polite children, only to be mortified in a restaurant with a temper tantrum. Stuff happens, to be sure. But when it comes right down to it, the deciding factor in whether your self attitude is good or bad is how truly you believe in yourself. If you know you are doing your best, regardless of the outcome you will be satisfied – and your attitude will reflect it. I think Art Linkletter expressed it best when he said“Things turn out best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out.”
Carlos Castaneda reminds us“We either make ourselves happy or miserable. The amount of work is the same.”My resolution this spring is to clean out my attitude so that I’m happy, not miserable. Why not do the same?
