Real Men Real Life: Stay Cool When Life Gets Hot
Hello men! This is C.A. Buttons. I wanted to share with you a testimonial from one of our members that you may find inspiring and help you navigate blocks of life when things seem hot. The moral of the story is to stay cool, focus, stay humble, man up, never give up & do not beat yourself up because your intentions are always good!
Mr. Buttons:
I am writing to the group today about two recent experiences that happened to me. Men like us take the weight of the world on our shoulders so that we can achieve our goals and help others. Sometimes, we lose sight of things in life that are important to ourselves and others. 99% of the time (because there is no 100%) this is not intentional so do not beat yourself up for it!
Men who achieve great things can fall into what I call the tunnel trap. It is not that we are not aware of things outside the tunnel, but we get into a routine that keeps us focusing on one or two items 24/7. When that happens, we lose sight of other things. Recently, work and caretaking have been my focus. It began to feel like Groundhog Day. Get up, go to work, take care of an aging parent, go to bed, repeat. Both of those areas have been successful, but my identity has become my achievements or defeats at work. During that time, I lost sight of those I love. It is not that I do not love them, but I did not take the proper amount of time to handle certain things that should have been handled long ago. That changed and now I am going to be handling things outside of my current identity & create a new one. I have reached out to a few individuals that truly care for me and it was cleansing! Having this epiphany has cleansed my soul and those items will be handled soon. Yes, there will be setbacks (that is life and the day you have planned may not materialize) but nothing will stop me from becoming a better version of myself. Which leads me to the second experience.
Knowing what you know from the first experience, I recently had a business trip out of town. I traveled approximately six hours by car. As I was approaching my destination my car began to overheat. It was raining and cold. I took it to an auto parts store and found a car repair shop that was open on a Sunday. They did not have a technician that day but had an employee that knew his way around cars outside of tire installation. The woman at the front desk very kind of my situation as well as the mechanic. They spent over two hours trying to see what was wrong. They found a few issues but could not repair them. They did not even charge me! It was a crap shoot if I would make it home. I completed my job that I was there for that day and headed home. The drive took three extra hours. To keep the car from overheating, I had to blast the heat in the car and keep the windows down. To say it was stressful and uncomfortable was an understatement. I had to stop several times to let the car cool down. Here is the interesting part. If this was a week ago, I would have fallen off the rails. I would have been “snappy” to those who helped me on the phone and over text message on my drive, my anxiety would have been through the roof, and I would not have been a nice person. Funny thing is none of that happened. I sat in my car, ate junk food, and watched television. Kind of refreshing. Yes, I was stressed and scared to death driving, but I kept level. I did not snap at those who were helping me. Think about it, these individuals are giving me their gift of time (which is the one gift in life you cannot give back) to help me, so why would I be mean. It just does not make sense! My old self would have probably done that and caused even more problems and stress for myself and those I love. This may not sound like a big deal, but when you commit to a higher power, re-focus and move forward good things will happen. Am I happy about the incident, no. Am I worried about cost, yes. Will it all work out, YES!
Take these and apply them to your own life. When your life gets hot, take a breath. Deal with it with kindness and compassion and people will be put in front of you that want to help and that care. Hold onto them, they will never leave your side even in bad times because they love you. If you love someone that is all you need, you can deal with the rest. However, celebrate the good times with them. Life is a journey of small victories and defeats, but those victories and defeats make you who you are and will help you cement your legacy in this world!
Comments