I was sitting here this morning, getting ready to send out a tweet, and I started to write, “Back to the grind after a super relaxing weekend.”
Then I thought, sure, I had a relaxing weekend, but I like my work. It doesn’t feel like something that grinds on me.
So instead, I started to write, “Back to the real world…”
Then I thought, what–my super relaxing weekend wasn’t real? Was it a figment of my imagination?
And herein, my lovely ladies, lies the problem.
You are what you verbalize
Shakespeare’s Juliet said, “That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” I disagree with the old bard.
If you call a rose a shitflower, while–yes–it may smell as sweet, you might refrain from ever knowing. (Because who wants to bend down and sniff a shitflower?) And even if you do catch a whiff, the word “shitflower” is going through your head. The word brings up an image. The image is a visual in your head. It’s brown. It brings to mind a memory. Your memory evokes a smell. It’s stinky. So you’re thinking about all of that while you’re inhaling the aroma of this beautiful, red shitflower. Then, someone hands you an equally beautiful, red flower. This one is called the rainbow flower. Which one is going to smell better to you?
So when you think of Monday morning as “the grind,” all the busyness, all the tasks you have to do… are they going to help you feel motivated and productive? Probably not. They are probably going to irritate you, to grind you down.
How was your day?
Every Sunday night, my husband groans about having to go to work the next day. And every night when he comes home from work and I ask him how it was, he makes it sound pretty damn awful. So one day I asked him, “Is it really that horrible? Geez. You should really look for another job if it’s this horrific to endure this work every day.” And you know what he said? He said, “No, it’s not really that bad.” And then he went on to list all of the pretty sweet things about his job.
My husband has a choice. He can choose to see the glass as half empty or half full. And it’s not just the way you frame your perspective; it’s not just about whether you’re an optimist or a pessimist. When I ask him how his day was, he can choose to tell me about the positive things that happened or he can choose to tell me about the negative things. Guess how he feels about work when he tells me the positive things?
Your life is real
Whenever you come back from vacation and think, “back to reality,” how do you think that trains your mind to envision your relaxing, enjoyable vacation? It tells you mind that relaxation and joy is not real. That your life shouldn’t encompass relaxation and joy. That those things are not real, but imagined, dreamlike, and unattainable.
Looking at life that way, how will you ever achieve your dreams? You won’t. They become truly unattainable. You just said so yourself.
What words will you be switching to to describe your life, to answer the “how was your day” question, to make your dreams a reality?
Here’s your challenge: Post on the Make Your Perfect Facebook page (under the post with the eyeball photo below) and write how your Monday is going. This time, I don’t want to hear venting for venting’s sake. Make it smell like a rose.
