Dealing With Little Things and Big Things

How I Met Your Mother is without a doubt one of my favorite TV shows. On top of being super long (hello, Netflix marathons) and hands-down hilarious, I love how the show is so diverse in tackling everything from social issues to day-to-day mini traumas.

The other night I was flipping through some TV channels and found HIMYM playing, so naturally I set the remote down and settled into my blanket. It turned out the episode playing was one of my favorites: the shattering.

As I laughed my way through the episode for what may admittedly be the hundredth time, I stopped mindlessly watching the show while scrolling down Facebook and actually started to think about the actual concept.

You never really noticed that Molly grinds her teeth when she eats until Bill points it out to you. You never really get annoyed by Todd’s persistent pen-clicking until Sarah complains that she can’t concentrate. You never realized that Mary constantly blew you off until Nick told you that you don’t deserve that.

There are so many little things that we do (out of habit) and don’t even think twice about. I consider myself a very detail-oriented person but I never realized that I tore apart small hamburgers (think: McDonald’s), until one of my friends brought it up.

People may say not to sweat the small things, but sometimes you just can’t help it! Sometimes the small things are big things in their own right. But that means you need to be able to tell the difference when something really matters enough for you to get upset over it.

I am one of those people who puts their heart and soul into everything they do, and while that’s great for my projects that succeed, it means I take my failures to heart that much more. I know I can’t be the only one out there who deals with this, so here are a few quick things to think about when deciding whether something is worth being upset over:

Is this something that will fundamentally change the course of your life? // This one is fairly obvious. Not winning Homecoming royalty isn’t going cause you to fail in life. It’s fine to be upset that you put in so much work for something you really wanted, but you shouldn’t get upset just because the cards weren’t in your favor.

Will this still be a problem tomorrow? // I don’t mean this in an avoidance or procrastination way, I mean this in a “Will this still matter tomorrow morning after you’ve had some sleep” kind of way. If you’re an over-stresser, you’ve probably had a fair share of incidents that were easily fixed by food in the tummy and a nice rest.

What can you do to solve the problem? // Last month I published a post about the Serenity Prayer. My, oh my, the number of times I have been upset and have had to think about it. When you want to change the world, every venture that doesn’t work out feels like a sandbag in the way of your river of Hope. But sometimes we can’t do something, sometimes we can’t make situations directly better.

Who do you know that can help you? // It’s okay if you can’t solve a problem by yourself every once in a while – that’s a lesson quite a few people I have met in college seem to have had a problem with. Learning how to ask for help when you need it is almost an art: you need help, your pride says you don’t need help, and you don’t want to seem weak. Don’t be afraid to ask for help; having someone to help you often takes a huge burden off of your shoulders – it takes a village, right?

Have you ever felt overwhelmed with even the smallest of things? Any advice on how to deal with it? 

xx

Catch you next time.