How Dryer Lint Can Ruin Your Life

Oh yeah.  mv5bmje2mze5mte5nv5bml5banbnxkftztcwodi4oduymq__v1__sy140_sx100_.jpg  The accumulation of all your leftover junky thoughtstreams about your many failures and weakness.  Story later today.

   We’ve lived in the same house for years which has a large laundry room on the second level.  The dryer, like all, has a removable lint filter (cleaned often) which has behind it a tube leading through the wall to the outside.  Sometime during growing up I was told that if you didn’t keep that tube clean, it was a fire hazard.  Then I’ve seen thirty foot wire brushes designed to clear that pipe.  (Okay, it was that Air Mall catalog always in the front pocket of your seat with the marshmellow gun.)  Then there is the occasional unexplained house fire.

   Think of this pipe as a room in your brain.  This room is full of bad stuff about yourself that you remind yourself about and worry that if enough lint accumulates . . . Oh, who knows?  But it will be awful.  So we need to worry.  

  On the occasion of a new dryer I called in a chimney sweep to clear out the pipe, which after all these years, had to be disgusting.  I left him to pull the old dryer away from the wall and get to work.

   He called me in a few minutes later.

   ”Clear already?” I asked.

   “Yep.”   He stepped to the side of the pipe hole in the wall.  “Do you see that light, ma’am?”

   “Yes.”

   “That’s daylight.  There’s no pipe here accumulating anything.”

  Turns out I made the whole story up.

You See What You Believe

vm__cr00352352_ss90_.jpg  The saying goes, “I’ll believe it when I see it.”  This is not how the human mind works.  We cannot see what we do not “believe.”  We cannot STOP seeing what we DO believe.

What does this have to do with relationships?  What does this have to do with being a happier person?

When we BELIEVE the other person is noticing us for our IMPERFECTIONS, almost any comment they make is taken as CRITICISM.

More later.

How to Be Fabulous

mv5bmjezmdkymzm3ml5bml5banbnxkftztywmdmzmti2__v1__cr620296296_ss90_.jpg   “The most important, most life-determining, conversation you have, is the conversation you have with yourself.”

What have you told yourself about you so far today?  Okay, now that we KNOW:  People who SEE THEMSELVES as BETTER LIKED than they actually are . . .  mv5bmje2mze5mte5nv5bml5banbnxkftztcwodi4oduymq__v1__sy140_sx100_.jpg

 As more SUCCESSFUL than they are . . .

As more ATTRACTIVE than they are . . .

As more INTELLIGENT than they are . . .

Those people have MORE FUN in life. 

Hey, I’m for more fun.  mv5bmjezntiynjkxnl5bml5banbnxkftztywmty0otc3__v1__cr00475475_ss100_.jpg  But I’m tired and envious just from making the above list.  Reading it doesn’t MAKE ME feel refreshed and ready to hit Broadway.  What I’m thinking is, “Sheesh, what’s wrong with me that I’m not kicking up my heels every hour of everyday?”

Oh, noooooo.  Now I remember.  It’s hard to change. 

If getting a grip on the on your EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM were easy, EVERYONE WOULD DO IT. 

Since it isn’t easy, we usually attempt an EXTERNAL solution– that is, we try to change other people’s response to us– by doing the list of things, and buying the endless image changers, offered every single month in every single magazine–

To an INTERNAL problem– the habitual conversation with have with ourselves.   Since we’re strategists, we:   1) expect situations to repeat; 2) study what we did in the past; 3) rehearse new material; and, 4) practice, practice, practice.

First, there is an ACTION.  Example:  Someone says to you, “It’s all your fault.  As usual, you are not listening.”  mv5bmte5ntg2mdq4of5bml5banbnxkftztywoteyotq3__v1__cr830318318_ss100_.jpg

Second, you PERCEIVE.  You hear and absorb, “It’s all your fault.  As usual, you are not listening.”  I know, perceiving seems so obvious, but it’s not.  How much of what you see and hear depends on the spounginess of your Emotional Guidance System, how “ready” to hear and see you are.

Third, you INTERPRET.  You decide what– “It’s all your fault.  As usual, you are not listening,” –MEANS.

Forth, you MAKE UP A STORY.  mv5bmtgymja2odm0ov5bml5banbnxkftztywmjg1mja3__v1__cr00485485_ss100_.jpg  You take your INTERPRETATION of what you think– “It’s all your fault.  As usual, you are not listening” –means, and develop a DRAMA.  “Your saying that shows you do not love me, respect me, want to please me.”

Then, you RESPOND.  (And, of course, if you’re me, the first words out are:  “Now look how YOU MADE ME feel.”)  mv5bmti1ntqwody4n15bml5banbnxkftztcwndq1mzazmq__v1__cr00300300_ss90_.jpg

So, what can you do?    mv5bmtqyodk4nzi5of5bml5banbnxkftztywmtc0ody2__v1__cr00450450_ss100_.jpg  How can you take charge?  

What does perception, interpretation, and making up stories have to do with the “conversation you have with yourself”?

Later . . . manana.

WHY depending on the OTHER PERSON for maintaining SELF ESTEEM does NOT WORK

mv5bmti0odu5ode1of5bml5banbnxkftztywmjm0nty3__v1__cr00327327_ss100_.jpg  ”Hey, buddy, I’m not feeling so good about myself.  Do something to fix me!”   

Bad news.  No matter how hard you try–how skinny, sexy, funny, good at the house, cooking, or whatever, you are– Relying on other people to keep you liking yourself WILL NOT WORK. 

    Why and damn, you say?

    1.  People are UNRELIABLE.    vm__cr700309309_ss100_.jpg

    Here you are this lovely person, doing what you usually do, being yourself, which he liked yesterday and now he has a problem with you.  You’re too controlling–

Truth from Last Therapist Standing:  Everyone is controlling.  We’re designed to “want” our own way.  There’s nothing wrong with that.  Some of us are just lousy at the game.  Now, I assume all of you are nice people who want good lives.  That being said, we also want others to have what they want.  We’re better off admitting, “Yes, I do want my way, but I’m willing to listen.”

    Okay, back to how you are being your usual self and today there’s something wrong with how you are.  But you haven’t changed.  People are unreliable in providing that approval feedback.  Could be they’re hungry.  Could be a bad day all around.

EVEN WHEN IT’S ABOUT YOU — IT’S NOT ABOUT YOU.

      2.  People preoccupied with THEIR OWN LIVES.  mv5bmtc3ntmzmdeynf5bml5banbnxkftztywmzkzntq2__v1__cr00345345_ss100_.jpg  I know.  Pretty nervy, huh?  Hey, I have needs here!  Oh, that’s not attractive?  What do you mean “egg shells?”   mv5bmty1njqxotg3of5bml5banbnxkftztywmdczntq2__v1__cr00352352_ss100_.jpg         Yep.  It’s not about you, but now you know that’s good thing.

   vm__cr00475475_ss100_.jpg   3.  People are difficult to TRAIN.  

     Long term marriage is truth enough.  No matter how METICULOUSLY we explain over and over what he’s supposed to say and do to keep me calm–he just keeps on being himself.  You could write a script.  Rehearse even.  I don’t know why other people are so stubborn about this.  So rigid and unwilling to TAKE CARE of MY FEELINGS at ALL TIMES.

mv5bmtkzmta0ode1nf5bml5banbnxkftztcwmjgwmdkxmq__v1__cr00335335_ss100_.jpg Yep.  There we were, happily married couple, rolling into the American Airlines gate at DFW.  I wanted to do one thing.  He thought my idea was a bad one.  That I’d never make it back in time to catch the next leg of the flight.  I really wanted to.  He really didn’t want me to.  I knew how to keep him calmed down. . . .