If you read most of the womens magazines, care giving is a real challenge. Also much is written about how recovering from a life-threatening illness and all its associated “stuff” is a real challenge. While you don’t see too much about it in writing, losing a sibling, particularly an older brother who has been there for you every step of the way, is a real challenge. And I have endured all of that plus losing my mother in the past five years—and I chose happy!
People ask me how I’ve managed. I think I know. I have always practiced selective retention. In other words, everyone carries emotional baggage (an imaginary radio flyer red wagon full of experiences). I just believe in picking my own baggage.
For example, I do not remember the day the doctor confirmed that I had cancer. If you forced me to, I could, but it doesn’t float to my mind like the answers in the old Magic Eight ball of our youth. (You remember, “Will tom invite me to the eighth grade dance? Undoubtedly so.”) Instead, I have selected to remember the day the same doctor skipped down the halls of the dignified Massachusetts General Hospital waving wildly the first “CLEAR” CAT scan results. That day I can describe in 3-D, Technicolor, and minute detail. I remember what I had for breakfast, what color my underwear was, where I parked, where we went to lunch to celebrate ... everything.
The same process applies to all my various challenges. Selective retention is the key ingredient in maintaining perspective. For example, my big brother succumbed to multiple myeloma after an eight-year battle. He was way too young I’ve chosen not to remember that very well or very often Instead I remember that when he was even younger he almost died in a bad car crash while he was in college. Coma, ICU, multiple surgeries, therapy—the entire enchilada was involved. So, I apply selective retention by remembering that because Peter survived then, I have my unbelievable niece and nephews, their kids, and countless wonderful experiences and memories with my brother in the ensuing almost forty additional years we had him.
Perspective allows you to file your current circumstances into your full array of past experiences thereby guaranteeing that you can choose happy. A stressful day with countless annoying delays, mistakes, and forgotten keys, phones, and small parts of your brain is instantly in perspective when your neighbor tells you her biopsy was benign. What you look for, is what you see ... in other words, if I’m thinking about buying a red truck, I suddenly see red trucks all over the road. If I’m looking for good experiences in my life to help me put the negative things in perspective, I’ll be sure not to miss them as they come and go.
Another skill set that has helped me choose to be happy has been introducing challenging, rewarding, and fun changes into my life. In the past two years, I’ve added another career to my resume (I’m a corporate trainer and now I’m also a real estate broker.) and I practice my new craft in a relatively new neighborhood. My dad and I moved to the beach in North Carolina two years ago. I wake up and love what I see. I go to work and love what I do. Why not chose happy?
Maybe I was born with an inherent optimism and maybe I was raised by two intuitively positive people. But I believe anyone can learn to pack their own little red wagons.
