If you are reading this, and either are or have been unhappy lately, particularly if you are angry about or with an issue or a person, I have some observations to share with you.  I warn you in advance, most people who hear what I will share find it difficult to accept; in fact some even get angry at what I am suggesting.  I will also tell you that the information is not really new, has been around for a long, long time and is really quite simple in theory.  What is not simple is the application of the information to our behavior. 

That this actually works, really has the ability to change the way we feel is somewhat remarkable.  I know that it works because it actually changed me.  Without going into a lot of detail, I’ll just say that prior to 1995, I was what you might describe as a typical Type “A” personality with an attitude and a very short temper.  In fact, I was quick to judge others by my own very rigid yardstick and allowed no deviation from that standard.  If you didn’t measure up, I didn’t have a very high opinion of you.  When people didn’t do things or act like I thought they should, I would get angry.  Depending on the importance of the issue at hand, I would range from ticked off to actual rages.  I remember quite vividly one instance where if a co-worker had not intervened, I was going to punch another employee who had done something to anger me.  That would have led to my dismissal, and curiously enough, I would have missed the opportunity to learn about this powerful ability.

Even a heart attack in 1986 wasn’t enough to alter this outlook; I remained the judgmental, hair triggered egotist I had been.  I stopped smoking, but not being angry.  I remained that way until 1995.

As a part of a Department of the Navy initiative, I attended a four-day seminar on Stephen Covey’s “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People”.  During this seminar, I began to see more clearly what kind of person I had become.  I also began to understand a very fundamental truth, the one that I will elaborate on here that was the beginning of a transformation.  I say beginning because the change did not occur quickly.  I was intrigued enough to volunteer to, become a client facilitator for the program and in December of 1995, I was certified to facilitate workshops within the Department of the Navy.

In the following years, I presented the 7 Habits material to nearly three thousand military and civilian members of the Navy and Marine Corps.  If you are familiar with the material, you may have already guessed where I am going, but if you are not, the 7 Habits is a collection of insights and principles that when combined, produce remarkable outcomes involving people.  One of these insights or principles is this:  How you feel, your emotional and often your physical state are in fact, totally controlled by you.  When you are angry at someone, or some thing, the fault lies not with the some one or some thing you are angry at, but with you!  Put a different way, nothing can really make you angry unless you let it.

Every time some says, “that makes me so mad!’ they have surrendered their feelings to whatever “that” was.  This is so amazingly simple, it is difficult for many to believe that it is the key to a host of emotional problems and issues that people experience every day.  Once I had been through the material four or five times, once as a participant and then as a facilitator, the immense power and influence that this one simple item can create am truly remarkable.

This does not mean I am now somehow perfect; far from it.  I am however, a much happier, calmer and I think more rational person.  I still get angry; I still make judgments, but far less often and far less violent.  When I combine this one fact with the other things I learned from the 7 habits, my life has become much more enjoyable.

It is hard for us as humans, to understand that from the time we are born, we are powerfully influenced by the world around us, and that influence is not always the best or most positive.  We are “conditioned” to be competitive and think in dichotomies like win-lose which have their place, but often become core or central values rather than part of a set of tools.  The key here is that being influenced does not automatically mean controlled.  Between whatever happens to us and our response to that occurrence, there is a tiny space.  It is what we put in that space that will determine our response.  Once we are convinced that we actually do control what goes in that space, we become truly more able to be happy.  Does that mean we always win or get our way? No, but it does mean that when we do not win or we do not get our way, we do not let it color our lives nearly as much as it could.
 
The next time you are tempted to say “That makes me so mad!” try to stop for just a second and ask yourself this question.  Five years from now, will this matter?  Chances are that you will fund that most of the time the answer is no and suddenly, things are not really as bad as you thought.   


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