What’s in your MANUAL?

You know the one. It lists what is acceptable human behavior in all circumstances. And we just really wish everyone would read our version and kind of FALL IN LINE.

Sounds a little ridiculous, but it is what we all think will make us happy. And maybe it would. The problem is that everyone has their OWN manual. And no two look the same. We have it in our head that there is a RIGHT way to be and we know what it is.

Just think of the ENERGY we’ve thrown away over the last 40 or 50 years in wishing someone would respond to us in a different way. Wishing they understood us better, or would give us more. The time we’ve spent feeling cheated because they JUST DON’T.

Friends who aren’t the kind of friends that we are to them, spouses who just won’t change, adult kids who seem to be forgetting you, bosses who don’t appreciate, parents who messed up or who continue to overstep.

Have you ever been around someone who is just stressed and turned upside down by every little thing. Who has the view that the world is just out for them? Angry all the time? It’s annoying, right?

But a lot of times what we are doing is just that on a smaller scale. We allow what someone else is doing or not doing to consume us, to ruin our day. When the only thing we can ever control is the reaction we choose to have.

Sometimes that means setting boundaries, limiting exposure to that person or maybe removing them from your life when the toll is too much. But I think the most important, MOST EFFECTIVE, boundary we can set is the one inside of us. The line of upset that you just don’t allow anyone to get through.

You will be much more successful in building and maintaining THAT, than getting other humans (with their own manual and perspective) to do things your way!

Of course you won’t be perfect. But even to hold that barrier half of the time WILL make you a happier person.