I’ve spent most of my life trying to figure out people. After teaching school, running hospitals, serving on boards, and watching our kids and six grandchildren grow up, you’d think I’d qualify for another degree. Surely, the continuing education credits alone would cover it.
Recently, social media offered me eight lessons that supposedly condensed years of therapy into a few minutes. There they were, tucked between a cooking demonstration and a dog trying to bite a sprinkler.
Thousands of dollars in counseling, apparently available while waiting for the microwave to finish my oatmeal.
Being a lifelong fan of pop psychology, I kept listening.
The first lesson said anxiety means you’re living in the future. That’s a little too convenient. Sometimes people have plenty to worry about right now. But I understood the point about borrowing tomorrow’s trouble.
As a hospital CEO, I worried about cash flow and meeting payroll. People depended on us. Still, at two in the morning, I could manufacture problems that hadn’t even been part of the question.
My grandchildren worry about getting A’s. My wife worries about anything that could disrupt our lives. I worry about everybody worrying. It’s practically a family business.
The second lesson said motivation fades. Ask anyone who bought exercise equipment in January and was hanging clothes on it by February.
But helping people has motivated me throughout my life. Teaching, healthcare, community work. Different offices, same reason for showing up. Maybe motivation lasts longer when the thing you’re doing matters to you.
Number three: habits change your life.
Make the bed. Do the laundry. Return the call. Keep your commitments. Exercise.
A doctor once told me twenty-eight days could establish a habit. That timetable worked for me, although people and habits don’t all follow the same calendar.
Nobody throws you a party for doing what needs to be done. Having clean underwear, however, is its own celebration.
The fourth lesson said your past is a chapter, not your whole story.
Most of us have chapters that could use a shredder. We remember an embarrassing conversation from forty years ago, then spend another afternoon wishing we could edit it.
You can’t woulda, coulda, shoulda yourself into a better yesterday.
Learn from it. Apologize if necessary. Make amends where you can. Then permit yourself to turn the page.
The fifth suggested that whatever triggers us may point toward something that still needs healing.
Not every strong reaction comes from an old wound, but a little curiosity helps.
One person hears fireworks and celebrates. Another remembers combat. Same noise, entirely different experience. Years in healthcare taught me that the chart never contained the whole person. Neither does a first impression.
Number six: control is an illusion.
Every strategic plan I approved eventually encountered something nobody had anticipated. You prepare, make decisions, and do your best. Then life throws a curveball.
We have influence. We have responsibilities. We don’t have the remote control for the universe, although a few people seem convinced they misplaced it.
The seventh lesson said our choices define us.
Usually, they’re small choices. Listen. Help. Keep your word. Admit you were wrong. Those decisions rarely earn applause, but they tell people who you are.
My list misplaced lesson eight, so I’m supplying acceptance.
At nearly eighty, I’m learning that accepting where I am doesn’t mean I’ve stopped caring. It means recognizing that I can’t do everything I once did, and deciding what I can still contribute.
I can write. I can encourage somebody. I can be useful. I can even make the bed, although that accomplishment has yet to interest a newspaper editor.
Eight easy lessons?
There’s nothing easy about being human. I’ve had almost eight decades of practice and still need reminders. My family would probably agree.
Maybe that’s what the list offered: a reminder to worry a little less, forgive a little more, and spend today doing something worth remembering tomorrow.
