Take it easy

Here's the idea:

A guy takes a taxi, and reaches home, with his mind not in the right place. He gets out of the taxi and picks out a tattered note from his purse and hands it over to the driver. Now the driver refuses to accept the shabby currency note, and says that he won't accept a worn out old note, and tells the guy to get a change from his house. (This is the present trend in India, where people just refuse to accept old looking currency notes that are worn out or carry stains, although they are valid according to the law)

1> Now when angry, this guy hits the roof. He shouts out the law to the driver. Calls hims names. Abuses him verbally, and a heavy argument follows attracting too many onlookers on the street. Finally the driver gives in and moves on with the tattered note, and our guy has won the day. But in the process he has managed to further deteriorate his mood, and is bound to quarrel again with his family members over inconsequential things.

2> Lets us consider that suppose an elevated person, who is put in the same scenario. When the driver declines the currency note, what does he do? He tells the driver that the tattered 10 bucks is the only change he has, and then he produces a 1000 bucks note from his purse, and offers it to the driver and tells him to provide the change. Now the driver doesn't want to loose all his change for sake of avoiding a old but acceptable currency note (or better still, he has no change). He accepts the old note without another word and leaves the place.

What is the difference between the two? Both of them got their work done, but in a different manner. The latter guy redeems his aura of calmness, but the angry man has fried up his own mood.

And who wouldn't want to be like the elevated man. Everyone of us seeks perfection. We want to do all that is right. We aspire to be successful at work, to outdo others at performance, to get the girl of our dreams, and to manage our day, coolly. We want to be happy!! And the biggest fact is all of us think we know what it takes to make ourselves happy. Yeah right!

Think again. What exactly happens when you get angry? You get angry when you don't have it all your way. Thats not all. When you quarrel with someone over a certain problem of yours, it means that you don't know how to solve your problem by yourself, and you are blaming others for it. Be reasonable. No one else gives a damn about your satisfaction.

The man who fights with in high pitched voice doesn't know any other way to fight, because if he did, he wouldn't have had to raise his voice. And not knowing how to deal with your problems makes you an jerk. Its obvious that some assholes will try to hoodwink or bushwack you for their own convenience. Every damn bastard is selfish these days. And if you wish to a successful person, you must first learn to deal every little trouble effectively without disturbing your own peace of mind.

"Anger only makes things worse because it exacerbates the difficult situation and can have have a destructive impact on your relationships, your career, and even your personal liberty"
-Pegasus NLP

The man who deals with intense pressure everyday, and yet gets his job done right, knows that the key to handle pressure is not to allow it to get inside his head. Once you know how to keep your cool, you are able to think of your problems as maths problems, which can be solved one way or another. To overcome our hurdles in an inventive and resourceful way, it is necessary that we don't lose our cool or push the panic button.

What nudged me to write this?

Just couple of months back I walked into Airtel mobile gallery to complain about my mobile service to their Customer Care. I waited for quite a long time for my turn as there was a lot of crowd and their management really sucks. The woman on the counter just entertained two men who had arrived after me. I complained to her about answering to them before my turn, and she said their problem was a minor one. I lost my cool and raised my voice, saying "So is mine". All of sudden there was a silence in the gallery, and that woman was terrified, and from her face I could make out that she was almost in tears. She attended my problem with urgency and handed me the note in a matter of minutes.

I got my job done and left. But I felt really bad about what I had done. The woman at the counter did make a mistake of course. But thinking later with an open mind, I realized that there were only five people there to handle 200 angry customers in a stuffy gallery, and you couldn't expect perfect management from that. It was the company's fault that they had no proper Customer Care service.

The next day I took some time off work and visited the gallery back, and apologized to that woman for losing my temper, and she was really overwhelmed by that. She said she really appreciated that I treated her with dignity. As I lost my SIM card few days back, I went back there again today, and this time she was really nice to me, and got me a duplicate SIM card even though I did not have the documents with me. She told me to get them later as per my convenience, disregarding the regular company policy of submitting the documents before the issue of a duplicate SIM card (I wasn't aware of the policy earlier).

The experience taught me a lot. I have decided, that from now on that I'll try my best to never lose my temper and composure, and always think before I say anything to anyone. I am determined to manipulate my attitude so that I would barely be deprived of my calm.

It is a really difficult task, as anger is a second nature to many people including me. But there is saying among my natives, "Kelyane hote" which literally translated means, "It is possible if you try".

How to do it?
I am gonna make wallpaper carrying a note "YOU MUST NOT GET ANGRY" have it on my desktop ( There is presently a note on my wallpaper saying "YOU SHOULD BE STUDYING ). Next time when I feel my blood boils due to unforeseen circumstances, the wallpaper should flash over in my mind, hopefully.