The Pencil Sharpener and the Trash

This morning, I went to empty out the over-full electric pencil sharpener. There was so many pencil shavings in it, it had solidified in several places. I had to empty it in stages, putting my finger in to the mass, and coaxing it out slowly. Then, I had to bang it forcefully against the trash can to get the shavings out of the grinding mechanism.

I was pretty proud of myself for getting it all emptied out without cursing or getting frustrated that it was so difficult. In that state of pride, I went to put the cover back on, piece the top together with the latch, and stuck a pencil in the sharpener.

Nothing. It didn't work. I think I broke it.

So I look at it closer, and I notice a gap between the bottom of the cover, and base of the sharpener. There's also a little button that needs to get pushed to complete the electrical connection to the device. It was missing a piece. The piece that fit under the cover, and pressed the button.

I didn't see a piece fall out, I didn't see any other bits. But it was obviously missing. There was a quarter inch gap, and the sharpener wouldn't work without that piece. So I went back to the trash where I dumped the shavings, and went through the trash bit by bit. Ew.

Still, I managed to not curse, not get mad. Just go through the trash, just go through the trash. It had to be there somewhere and cursing or getting mad wasn't going to make it easier, I told myself. I remembered the monks who use cleaning toilets and scrubbing floors as practice. Just go through the trash.

After going through a bit of the pile, I reached last night's meal of burritos, refried beans, and salsa. It couldn't have fallen this far, could it? But it wasn't anywhere else. Plus, I didn't even know what I was looking for, since I didn't remember seeing the piece fall off. I imagined what the piece must look like, and kept digging around. In the muck. In the goo. Ew.

But after much digging, and several mantras later, there was no denying it. The piece just wasn't there. Or, I simply wasn't seeing it. I started berating myself - how could I have been so dumb to drop that in the trash? Why couldn't I find it? Now it's broken, and I'll have to buy a new one. One more chore to do! My husband is going to be annoyed, and think I'm an idiot. My kids will be disappointed. All I wanted to do was clean out the pencil sharpener, and look what happened.

I was deflated.

As I was looking at the machine, mad at myself, kicking myself for adding more to my to do list, and going through all the things that were wrong with this particular situation - about a pencil sharpener! - I saw the solution.
Not sure how it happened upon me, but it did. I had put the cover on upside down.

I flipped it over, and it fit perfectly. There was no missing piece.

Let us reduce our suffering by having the awareness to see problems from multiple directions, and letting ourselves have patience before assigning blame, projecting into future problems, and worrying what others might think.

March Is "Stop Your Drama" Month

You know them - the people who create drama when none is there and the people who make a mountain out of a molehill. These people enjoy creating drama. For whatever reason, they feel compelled to make a big deal about everything from the way someone looked at them, to the guy who honked at them on the freeway, to the weather.

We all make drama from time to time. Sometimes we need to create drama to emphasize how important something is. Or perhaps we make drama because we need to vent. Other times, though we make drama to get sympathy, to get revenge, or simply because we have no other tools to deal with what we see as a difficult situation.

Let's stop all this drama, and work together to find peace.

Does that mean giving up and ignoring everything bad that happens to us, or saying, "It's fine no matter what anyone does?" Does it mean to let everyone walk all over us? No, it means to stop our drama so that we can make thoughtful decisions and we give other people room to make thoughtful decisions, too.

There are actually two kinds of drama. Marlene Chism, of Stop Workplace Drama, explains the difference.

"The important distinction is “the” drama versus “your” drama.  The drama happens. The drama is the circumstance…the obstacle we have been talking about. Your drama is how you experience and deal with the obstacle. Do you feel capable to navigate around the obstacle, or do you freak out?" 

Drama happens. It's part of life. Anything that happens that we don't have control over, anything that keeps us from our goals, anything we find challenging, that's "the" drama. "Your" drama is when a person brings in their own personal baggage into a situation and escalates the problem or creates new problems. Most of the time, "your" drama is thinly veiled emotional baggage. 

"The" drama we're all faced with. Watch a person deal with the drama of the world to see who they are. "Our" drama is what we bring into the world ourselves by choice. When a person brings in their own drama, it makes it even harder to deal with the drama that already exists. In essence, they make their own drama the primary target of effort.

"Stop Your Drama" month isn't about fixing other people. It's about making a choice for ourselves to not put our drama on everyone else's plate. Finding ways to deal with difficult situations that help everyone and dealing with our own emotions in a healthy way is a positive alternative to handing a piece of our drama to anyone who will listen.

Passive aggressive behavior, aggression, blaming, complaining without a plan to make things better, bringing up concerns without a purpose, undermining other people's efforts, making jokes at other people's expense, throwing someone under the bus, and spreading rumors are examples of how we create drama.

Stopping our drama means focusing on our goals, connection and support of others, and maintaining our personal integrity. If we all did that, it wouldn't take the challenges away, and it wouldn't be ignoring what's going on. If we all left our drama out of it, it would make the challenges we do face a lot easier to deal with for everyone.