Arminda Lindsay

Being On Purpose

I’m Upset Because. . . .

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I'm Upset Because

Sarah told me the following story from her childhood and with her permission I’m sharing it with you.

Sarah’s mother, Mary, had prepared one of her usual delicious evening meals and invited the five hungry children to the table to eat. Not long after they sat down, Sarah’s father, Dan (who had made a choice to visit the pub after work rather than coming straight home), entered the kitchen through the back door.

Dan was visibly irritated to discover the family eating without him and started loudly verbalizing his displeasure. Quietly and without comment, Mary began opening the kitchen windows one by one as Dan continued his rant.

Suddenly, as if only just noticing his wife’s activity, Dan shouted, “Why on earth are you opening all the windows?!”

Unfazed, Mary sat back down at the table, casually picked up her fork and replied, “I want to be sure the neighbors know how upset you are!”

Each of us is responsible for our own emotions.

Upsets (“I’m upset because. . . “) only occur inside of us. No one else can ever upset you, or make you angry, or disappoint you, or make you sad, or cause any emotional response in you. That’s all you. Only you. Every single time.

You have a choice every single time you find yourself in an upset:

1. REACT and blame someone or something else and see if that really feels good to you. Does it make you feel any better sitting in that discomfort and pointing a finger, validating all the reasons it’s not possibly your fault?

2. Take a deep breath and look inside yourself first (before you start pointing fingers) and ask yourself what’s really triggering you in this moment? Then RESPOND with awareness of your internal issue that simply wants attention and resolution.

Pema Chodron said,

You are the sky. Everything else — it’s just the weather.

Take back ownership of your emotional well-being. Resolve whatever triggers your upsets. Dance because it’s raining and notice the sun’s refusal to shine has nothing to do with you.

Feedback

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Feedback

The lens through which you choose to see your life experiences determines the quality of life you live.

And every single time you experience something you get to choose anew your response to said experience.

But only every single time.

Feedback is a highly effective way to grow ourselves and to positively impact the lives of those around us, both professionally and personally.

Too often we receive and give feedback from a negative emotional space. When on the receiving end we don’t want to hear something we perceive to be a negative judgement against us. When giving we have often already passed judgement against the other person and our feedback is couched in negative energy.

Feedback, however, is nothing more than information that allows you to evaluate how you’re doing.

Instead of judging the information, receive and give feedback neutrally and with love.

If you’re receiving what you perceive to be negative energy, just ask yourself if it’s your issue or whether it belongs to the person delivering the information?

And once you’ve neutrally received the feedback, how you want to use it is entirely up to you! When we stay in neutrality around the exchange of information — leaving emotions out of it — we can more-readily see the possibilities of how that information might be of benefit.

Remember, it’s just information — how might that improve and/or shift your reception and delivery of feedback?

Echoes from the Past

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Echoes from the Past

If you look closely you will see the handprint on the wall.

I am not ashamed to admit I left it there in its perfectly-smudged form for about ten years and every time I flipped on the light in that room I could see that handprint, an echo of my past.

No one else knew about that hand smudge; it was my secret ritualistic game to look for it always waving at me every single time I entered the room.

Some months ago I had the entire room painted, including that spot, although for a brief moment I entertained the thought of framing that handprint and painting around it so as to preserve that tiny reminder of what used to be.

That handprint is a lot like our real-life made up echoes from our past. We’ve all got them. They’re the stories we believe about ourselves and about:

  • why we are who we are
  • why we do what we do
  • why we can’t help ourselves
  • why we behave in cyclical patterns that show up again and again, on repeat

Those are echoes, stories, see-able only by you every time you walk into that room of your past, the one with the handprint still on the wall because you’re holding onto it for sentimental reasons, and you have a ritual of seeking it out without anyone else noticing it waving at you.

Does that handprint/echo/story really serve you to keep it there?

Just as I could have easily wiped down the wall and erased the handprint, you, too, can erase the handprints that you’re currently keeping. Those handprints might be holding you back, inviting you into a past that no longer exists.

Say goodbye to the handprint, acknowledge the lessons and the blessings you’ve learned because it was part of your journey, and grab a sponge, a magic eraser, or a bucket of paint and gift yourself a clean wall.

You can only be held back by your past if you use it to reject yourself in the present.    — Robert Holden

Learn. Erase. Grow. Repeat.

Drop the Antlers

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Drop the Antlers

Katie is three and she recently performed a dance routine in which she portrayed a very convincing reindeer. Following the performance the dance teacher collected all of the antlers back from the children in the class, at which time Katie portrayed a very convincing three-year-old having a temper tantrum.

And almost before it started, the temper tantrum portrayal was over, as Katie fluidly moved into a portrayal of a very convincing three-year old running around with her friends and squealing with delight, reindeer antlers forgotten.

You are not three.

You perform every single day, weaving yourself in and out of presentations, conversations, projects, relationships, car lines, checkout lanes, supper preparations, laundry foldings, volunteering, civic responsibilities, and a myriad other -ings daily.

And sometimes your antlers get taken away. Do you throw a tantrum when that happens? Go ahead. Admit it.

And because you’re not three, you forgot to squeal with delight at the next thing that happened and so you keep throwing your tantrum long after the antlers have left the building.

You carry your tantrum and tell your co-workers, or your spouse, or your closest friends on Facebook, or you take your tantrum out on the bank teller processing your request, or you don’t listen to your employee because your tantrum is occupying too much space in your head, or you let the tantrum speak on your behalf when you’re stuck in traffic, or you decide it’s justified to be short with your children at the end of your workday because that tantrum wants to be heard. . . . for days and weeks on end it wants to be heard.

Tantrums are only a ruse for your ego and every time you hold onto your tantrum, your ego is using you to get all the attention. Your ego is not you. Don’t be fooled.

Katie is a walking, running, squealing expressive example of exactly what you keep forgetting: just drop the antlers.

Remember, you are not three.

All the Feelings

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All the Feelings

Events and/or others’ actions can seem to cause a rush of emotions and questions and fears, all erupting simultaneously within us.

Inherent in this “system” of reacting is a misunderstanding about the reason we are upset at all.

Commonly, we believe events and other people cause our feelings.

Because ________ happened, I’m devastated.
When __________ took place, it forced me to say something.
He said _________ and it really upset me.
She did _________ and I’m so mad because of it.
They didn’t _________ and now I’m completely frazzled.

EVENTS/PEOPLE ==> FEELINGS

However, when we pause between event and response, there is a small space in which we formulate a thought about that event, and to that thought we attach an emotional reaction.

Events and people don’t cause our emotions. Rather, our thoughts about the event or the person create the feelings.

What?!

We have the power within us to own and to control and to generate the very emotions and feelings we want to experience WHEN we see the connection between the event and the reaction.

EVENTS/PEOPLE ==> THOUGHTS ==> FEELINGS

Viktor Frankl said:

Everything can be taken from [someone] but one thing: the last of human freedoms — to choose one’s own way.

Choose to be free from the emotional weight of other people’s actions and the events you do not control. Choose to emotionally experience life in a way that fills you up and not in a way that depletes you. Choose to pause — take that proverbial deep breath and count to ten — and choose what to think.

Events only provide us with information and nothing more.

005: If You Really Wanted To, You Would

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If You Really Wanted To, You Would

The All Arminda Virtual Show, episode 5

Arminda bought a magnet that says: IF YOU REALLY WANTED TO YOU WOULD

It’s never about not knowing how to do something, or needing to think about it, or saying you want to talk about it with someone else.

This is an action-filled episode with a BONUS dramatic pause included!

Don’t get caught up in the “herd mentality” of behavior.

You have all of your own answers: your own inner knowing. Tap into that.

Loving you,
arminda

Course Corrections

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When you’ve set your goal and you think you’re on target to achieve it and something disrupts you along your path — what do you do? Many of us get upset, frustrated and angry at ourselves, we question our ability to get anything done the “right” way and oftentimes use the disruption as the sign for us to quit altogether.

Before you do any of those things, watch this video.

Headlights 101

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Headlights 101

My daughter recently got her own car and just before sending her off on her inaugural drive, we quickly ran through the obvious how-to checklist:

  • windshield wipers
  • defrost front AND back windows
  • headlights

Several weeks and many nights later, she mentioned to me that the headlights were so dim she couldn’t see the road without using her bright lights. She was scared to drive in the dark until the lights were fixed.

Together one night we sat in her car and she turned on the ignition, turned to me and gesturing through the front windshield said, “See?!”

“I see you haven’t turned on the headlights yet,” I replied.

“They’re on right now!” she insisted.

“Turn the dial again and see what happens,” I suggested.

Sure enough, with one additional turn of the dial the headlights flared and she exclaimed, “But those are the bright lights!”

“No, those are your regular lights. The high beams require a little extra effort to activate,” I laughed, thinking about her sneaking around with only her parking lights for guidance while there were other cars on the road, and as soon as she was alone, she would turn on her regular lights.

How many of us metaphorically drive around with our dim parking lights, unsure of how to turn on our regular lights or nervous to use our light in front of others?

You don’t have to drastically change your life, quit what you’re doing, leave your relationship, start your own business or relocate your family. You don’t even need to dust off your list of long-ago abandoned resolutions.

Just turn up your light where you are right now and see if things appear brighter because you are now shining one dial brighter than before.

allarminda.com | 2024