We all get a stress head full of hassle on a regular basis.
God knows the number of times I’ve woken up with an already thumping head due to my life and work schedule. I’m sure you can recognise that too. Some may argue it’s the price of modern life. I’d say it’s been around for decades and probably will for plenty more.
Our heads are our computers. They run our show.
They arrange, support, calculate, scan for threats, store information, remember information, and generally are like a 100 PA’s.
Boy, do they do a lot!
However, just like overworked assistants they get stretched and pressured and it all becomes hassle. Too much hassle. The head almost hurts and feels attacked from all sides.
When we are hassled we get anxious, angry, and forgetful. We just don’t like it. It causes major stress as I’ve written about in SuperMind Saturday.
But, there is one very telling reason why you should welcome hassle.
It may be just about to save your life!
High level hassle.
Sit back and enjoy the flight, is what the captain of our plane tells us.
So, sit back we do, pop on a movie, get fed some meals, recline in our seat, and leave our stresses on the ground for a while.
That’s what Peter Hogenkamp and his partner did on his late night Cross Air flight from Berlin to Zurich in November 2001. He was tired and really needed to get some shut eye, but the three members of the Dutch-German all girl group, Passion Fruit, were being noisy and disruptive in the seats in front. They had been at a gig that night and were still in electric mood and excitedly fired up.
Hassled and with other seats available they switched rows away from the annoyance hoping to get some rest before they landed.
Not longer after flight 3597 plunged into wooded hills 2.5m short of the runway killing all but nine people. Peter and his partner Jacqueline and one member of the band survived.
Peter was so hassled he changed seats, but this changed his whole life by saving it.
This is how hassle works. It may not be some message from the angels or the fates favouring you. What it will be is forcing a change that can save you from a lot of future problems and, potentially, save your life.
Hassle may be help all along.
Late but alive.
We have all been running late for work.
Whether it’s sleeping in, kids delaying us, or traffic snarl ups, we’ve all turned up behind time. Often this leads to little consequence bar a minor ticking off, but once in a while it prevents us losing far more than a few minutes work time.
That was what was going through Prasad Govenkar’s mind one morning as he struggled to get to work without being late. His alarm clock decided not to work and he spilled coffee down his shirt in the rush to be ready.
Worse still the trains were delayed due to signalling problems on the line. He was hassled and prepared himself for the rebuke from his boss in the city for not being at his desk as usual.
But those hassles that played out in his mind would be the very saviours that kept him alive.
The city was New York, the date was September 11th 2001, and his office was in the World Trade Center.
The collective stress of his non-functioning alarm, black coffee mishap, and train hold ups that had his head racing, soon had it racing for a different reason. Fundamentalist terrorists flew 2 passenger airplanes into both Twin Towers with the loss of nearly 3000 lives. All those in and around Prasad’s office space were killed.
Hassle had once again stepped in so he survived.
Minor not major.
Now I don’t want to paint a bleak picture here.
Any hassle you go through doesn’t predict some bad omen has been prevented from getting to you. The truth is even if they make us tear our hair out, most hassles are only short term annoyance and irritations. They are usually minor not major.
There is another point I’m making.
Hassle may be a re-direction.
It provides feedback about our life that, if we were to consider more, is trying to get us to evaluate things.
Traffic delays yet again on our commute may ask if we’re doing the right role in the right place. Or similar if we have continual staffing shortages that push up our workload. Or our partner always changing plans and we never know what we’re doing half the time could be a hint that the relationship might not be the one for us.
These won’t kill us as such, but they hassle us to get our attention.
I actually think hassles may secretly be wake up calls. They dial up the frustration so much we just want out of the specific scenario or life situation that it links to. After one too many awful days in a job that doesn’t appreciate us and there was no pay rise, we decide it’s finally the point to start our own business. We’ve tried to mend old family wounds with family members we didn’t create, but after another painful gathering, it’s best friends only for us now.
And the biggest alarm clock of all with hassle – heath alerts.
They usually come with body and mind related effects – migraines, anxiety, etc but also extremes can lead to more serious symptoms. At which point you get the message that this has got to stop for the good of your wellness.
Hassles can be our friends you see!
Hear the hassle.
Hassles effectively shout at us. They don’t do whispers.Or subtlety.
We all notice them, which is a good thing inside out. The skill is to look beyond the presented problem to the bigger picture of why that keeps showing up. If we can spot the background truth we are on our way to positive change.
Leaving the house for the wrong job 20 mins earlier to miss the jammed roads meaning less sleep just ain’t it. Working out that the current job or hours is the culprit will give you leverage to make changes.
Being annoyed by your partner’s constant change of schedule so you are going to have it out with her once and for all may not be wise. The true baddie in this just might be you in the people you continually date in the first place that treat you like this.
So, take a wider look at your repeat hassles.
They DO point the pathway out of them through proving you are on a wrong turning somewhere. And, hardest of all, that it has been your own choices, actions, and beliefs that had landed you right in the middle of them.
Hassles don’t start your headaches, they come to end them.
Because hassles change lives, guide lives, and even save them!!
Most people do but only on the little everyday things. Ones that never change their whole life. Most change their minds on what to wear, what to eat, their favourite night spot, and general stuff that isn’t Earth shattering.
It’s not that we are scared to change our mind, we are just to used to only using it to get by and run our daily schedules.
But, few ever change their mind completely in ways that alter the whole shape and path of their life.
I’m sure you haven’t either.
We humans tend to be creatures of habit overall. Some may explore and be more adventurous, but the majority of us stick to a narrow range of experiences. And a small range of thoughts. Our mindsets are fixed and become stuck in repeat patterns.
There is a phrase that says, ‘You are only one decision away from a whole new life’.
And that is true because that decision is to change your mind.
Making the Write Decision.
We all love a trip to the movies.
For the escapism, for the entertainment, for the incredible stories we see. Some are that incredible because they aren’t just off the scale, they are off the planet. One of which became one of the best known of all sci-films. But only because it’s creator changed his mind.
A young teenage enjoyed writing. But he told himself he could never make a living from it and so decided to make a career as a software engineer as it was a well paid role in those days.
But time changes everything, and it also changed his mind.
He continued it as a hobby in his spare time until one day he decided he would write his own novel and self publish it. This was the best decision of his life.
This book was The Martian and the author was Andy Weir. The book went on to make the New York Times bestseller list and, of course, it was made into a Hollywood film starring Matt Damon. The film alone made $630 million worldwide with the book selling over 5 million globally.
All of which because Andy had a mind switch and believed in his writing and did something about it.
A changed mind about something he always loved, kept doing, and always wanted to explore.
Maybe that mirrors you too?
Making a Meal Out of it.
It’s not just one thought that can change your life, one meal can too!
In her mid-thirties one lady was lost. She had tried various roles in secretarial work, governmental posts, and advertising. None of them inspired her and she felt unfulfilled and stuck.
Until she had a French meal at a restaurant in Rouen. Being a keen culinary person the various tastes and textures changed her mind about food as a career. She had always enjoyed concocting her own recipes and now a green light switched on in her imagination.
At first she failed her exams at the prestigious Le Cordon Bleu. Her mind though was fixed and she persisted even though her fellow students believed she could never make the grade.
Not long after she released her own cookbook – Mastering the Art of French Cooking. It flew off the shelves in her native USA as Americans rushed to try French cuisine for themselves at home. She was 49 by then but she had never changed her mind back from her original decision.
She was Julia Child who went on to form a whole empire around food. When she passed away in 2004 she was worth $38million.
All from a nice meal and changed mind about her ability to create her own versions that others would love.
That’s the one change in life that can work wonders.
Heading in a new direction.
Review those true success stories above.
Two people who took a personal interest and changed their mind about what they could do about it.
You will find the same with a whole range of comedians, singers, artists, writers, inventors, and all type of business owners. The idea, the love, the skill, was always there. It was only when their mentality did a 180 did it set them off on a whole new pathway in life.
I did the same when I was in my twenties and quit my job to follow my love of being a tennis coach. When I retired in 2016 I had been a world qualified coach who got to play at Wimbledon, compete against Greg Rusedski, and been on court with Prince William in my career.
Not bad for a local working class guy who gave up a good, secure employment to go after what his mind believed he could.
And so over to you. What is, or has been for some time, spinning around your mind that you never used to think you were good enough at to make work? Or that it could never be turned into a regular income?
Revisit it. Change your mind about it. Think again.
See it as if your are already there doing it. And go do it. Like Andy and his sci-fi and Julia and her french style cooking.
You truly can change your life if you change your mind about one little thing that’s already in you. A thing you CAN do or CAN be something.
And can start as soon as you alter your mind about it.
Change your mind and change the whole destiny of your life for all your life.
Did you ever have a best friend that your parent’s didn’t like?
In our schooldays many of us had a friend or even a small group of pals we hung about with.The more time we spent with them, the more we became like them. And more often than not, that got us into trouble.
Our parent’s would soon ban us from seeing them as they were a ‘bad influence’.
The effect of being around them all the time meant we acted less out of our character and more out of theirs. Perhaps because they were cooler, or usually more popular, but definitely because they were confident backed it up with big talk.
We fell under their spell. The spell of influence.
And influence will always be a powerful force in our lives. And in our minds!
The voices of authority.
The first influence we ever have on our minds are our parents.
They looked after us most of the time to begin with so their views, advice, do’s and don’t’s, standards and values, ethics, beliefs, guidelines, and opinions were the first to be imprinted on us. Imprinted in our minds and our conscience.
Soon after along comes the next voices of authority.
These people add to the rules of the game in life. They will be our teachers and those in similar positions of power who spend the next greater proportion of time with us to influence who we are. With them extra behaviours and rights and wrongs in relation to others and the world will be applied to our mental banks.
Finally, as we move into teenager time comes the final line which will be coaches or leaders of the activities we participate in most from tutors after school or sports coaches. They bring the final layer inputting elements of discipline, effort, dedication, teamwork and the like.
By the time we become adults we are effectively fully influenced by others and the world we have picked up a little ourselves.
No wonder as we hit our mid-teen phase we rebel and seek people who are almost anti the influences we have been given. They represent freedom, being yourself, and breaking free of being told rather than asking yourself what matters.
But, influence has evolved in the 21st Century.
The new influence breed.
The word influencer is on everyone’s lips now.
That’s perhaps because everyone believes themselves to be this and is online saying so. There is actually some psychology to back this up.
If you wish to read and understand more Robert Caldini has written an excellent multi million selling book on how it all works called, ‘Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion’.
As we spend more time in the orbit of peer type people, we begin to elevate the accuracy of what they say or do. In this modern world the time we spend ‘with’ someone who we look up to or admire is from watching social media. As we can commit ourselves to listening/watching many times a day, we can be in their company again and again.
Do that on repeat and soon these people get into our psyche. We begin to filter in subtle elements that tell us they are believable. Their number of followers and likes, the amount of video views etc. Add to that their announcements of how much they are earning or how their lifestyle is increasingly upgrading. We soak it all up.
These factors automatically add weight to what they present and prove to us they should be listened to. They are the truth and their influence has well and truly grabbed us.
With the advent of the internet this has given the dark side of humanity a voice.
A voice of anger, war, accusation, fundamentalism, and crime hooks plenty in through the process above. The tentacles of influence can reach far and wide and trap many in.
Now we don’t have to go anywhere to hang out with the bad influences our parents warned us of.
Who is influencing you?
Influencers (anyone anywhere not just social media) get in our heads.
That’s what they are good at. They make us believe.
From drug dealers to our old school mates going to beers every Saturday night. Their skill at persuasion means it’s difficult to say no. Watch them enough and you will be convinced you need to act and believe like them. And soon you want to be like them too.
That’s how influence has always played out.
Someone talks proudly and strongly enough and we see them as someone we aspire to become. Even marketers use this cleverly. They create characters in adverts that we imagine we could be. While we’re doing that we open our wallets to buy the product they were promoting because if they have it, we should too.
Influence goes further in this internet age. We can be persuaded to support a dubious cause, change our ethics, donate to any type of charity, and even send all our savings to a lover abroad who will pay us back soon.
From your bestie mate Barry at high school to joining the Flat Earth Society, influence lasts a lifetime.
And so you need to ask yourself what or whose influence you are under. Or have always been under?
That influence is running your show and perhaps ruining your life (tried the new Mango Vape the celebs use yet??).
Influence is everywhere, you need to work out what influence is IN you!
Five thoughts, ideas, insights, or quotes to power up your mind to think differently and creatively about life and who we are. Put all previous thinking away and open up a brand new world of the Supermind. YOUR SuperMind.
This week – Community.
We live in global economy now. One big globally linked market. And as a global life we are forever travelling to meet others around the globe. Where we once lived a local existence, now that seems to hold most back. The advent of social media has shown them the world and they want to be part of it. There are plenty of winners in this but the one that seems to have lost is the community. Where it once thrived at a local level the global mindset means it is struggling today for its identity. And this means SMS has to take a look.
1. Community = common unity.
This definition isn’t official. But it’s mine. To define a community it is a localised area with shops, buildings, streets, services, and people who share this space. However, it’s far deeper than that. There is often a history that still exists and pulls the citizens together in a proud experience of living there plus all the related feelings and beliefs that come with it. But the whole social media era has formed a mindset of go everywhere away from home to see and be seen and show the world where you are. Our common unity is less visable now.
How do we get a common unity back in the areas we live in?
2. Has the community headed online?
In developing and designing this blog I came across a host of various graphic artists and brand creators. Previously I had to travel around locally (and perhaps even further) to find even one or two people like this. But the arrival of the internet has seen the like minded and even the like skilled banding together in hubs. sites, and groups to help promote and market their portfolios. From historical groups to online marketers anyone anywhere can find what they want in this effect online community.
Has the real community given way to online versions for good?
3. Changing world, changing community.
Traditionally the community had local roots and remained that way. Most citizens were born, brought up, and lived in that area or nearby. Therefore community closeness was high as people wanted to follow on from their families and friends in caring about their home and heritage. That has fast been eroded. As economic times have enforced mass migration and the need for new work forces, the community is less local knit and more imported. It’s taken some adjustment at the local level and is still adjusting.
Should the community just be needing time to refind itself for the modern age?
4. High street is the heart.
Where would the heart of the community be? Where do the citizens gather as one more? This was the high street. Our central shopping area where we would head for to buy our household needs. While there we would meet and talk to shop keepers, neighbours, friends, family, fellow shoppers and even work colleagues. We would learn each others stories or updates on local news, find out about events going on, and generally connect with all members of society. Not so now. The high street is dying. Shops are closing en masse so the community has lost its heart.
How do we get the community heart back or where can we go to find it these days?
5. Community is a spirit.
Community is not just a place. It’s an inner sense of belonging. A spirit and feeling that we hold that we are among a neighbourhood of those like us in so many ways. People who have chosen to live, work, socialise, and raise families in the same locality as we have. While the high street maybe the heart, it is within us that a community has a soul. Put together, we hold dear, protect, and seek to ensure the very survival of our own community. And so to finish today a timely reminder that always….
A community exists if it continues to live in the hearts and minds of those that live there.
Ok, that’s another SuperMind Saturday done. Thank you for being here for the SuperMind time. Keep thinking about these. We need more minds thinking about this issue and the others issue on SuperMind Saturdays. Why? Because it’s needed. Because the world requires new thoughts and ideas. Perhaps YOURS!!
See you next time for more super thinking.
Photo attributions – free to use under Pixabay Content License by TungArt7 and TyliJura.
You know, let your mind drift on to another life you could live? Or some better story than the one you are currently living?
I’m sure that most of the world has done that at some time or other. And plenty of us have been doing it today.
When we do such things they feel good to us. They lift our mood and take our head somewhere better than where it currently is.
But others see this behaviour as a mistake. They see it as us believing in some fairy tale or miracle that just won’t happen. We will get advised to come back to reality, be realistic, and stop living in a fantasy world.
And so we go back to our normal humdrum existence accepting that perhaps it wasn’t good for us in the first place.
But, that would be a mistake as our well meaning advisors are wrong and we are very right to enjoy escapism.
Because, in fact, it is a very healthy thing to do!
These sugar sweet Christmas tales revolve around someone who has been badly hurt suddenly finding love at Christmas. Usually they have travelled to some small town and discover happiness where they least expected to find it.
And we watch these Yuletide love movies in our droves. In 2021 for example over 80 million people viewed one of their Christmas editions in the US alone. They may seem far fetched and a fantasy, but we love the made up illusion.
Maybe it’s love we seek or belief that amazingly great things can happen out of the blue.
In truth, we know it’s escapist entertainment, but our minds love it and need it. Because they need to escape too.
The pressure of life on our mentality today is intense. From increased stresses at work or getting work, the cost of living, energy crisis, affording a home and bills, and wars and conflicts regularly springing up, mentally we feel besieged. Our heads are exhausted watching and worrying at the next potential threat or concern.
The figures are stark. Some 1.2 BILLION people worldwide are now living with a mental issue. This is DOUBLE the number recorded in 1990. Our mentality is struggling to cope with modern life. I have written about Stress on this blog and new ways of approaching it.
For now though our minds need a break from the negative it has to deal with it. And that’s where escapism comes in.
We don’t disappear into Cedar Hollow for a Christmas film. We escape our pressure cooker existence to see if Beth will find love with Matt as she bakes grandma’s old cookies for the Christmas Cookiethon competition.
Which saves out head health and makes us feel better all over!
Imagining a happier world.
What do you imagine?
If you are like the vast majority of humans, you imagine all the things that could go wrong. From losing your home due to the spiralling costs of living to having no job plus other personal pitfalls you are worried over.
We are brilliant at imagining…..the worst.
Far from escaping into an amazing life, we take our minds into some hell hole type existence. Again and again. Come on, be honest, when did you last think and see an awful event coming your way in your mind? Last week? Last night? Ten minutes ago?
By now we all have learnt what this leads to. Anxiety, high stress levels, blood pressure issues, poor sleep and concentration, irritability, and emotions all over the place.
All from seeing a bad self played movie in the mind.
So what do you think indulging in mental escapism will do for you? You know it! Enhanced health at every level and a far more enthusiastic outlook on life. So long as you escape into existences that can occur (nice house by a river, your own marketing company, getting a book published) you will be alright. Go off into la la land envisaging yourself the best friend of Richard Branson and his new business advisor or Kylie Minogue falling in love with you (ok that was mine), and you’ll end up hating your current life.
Be a personal escapist and you will drift off into nice places and into improving health too.
Imagining a happier world puts a smile on your mouth and in your body.
Nothing lost, everything to gain.
Imagine being on a white sandy beach in Barbados.
Or swimming with dolphins or opening your own coffee shop with its own pet zone.
Whatever your escapism moments are, don’t stop having them. They protect your health and project your aspirations. Two perfect outcomes. In fact, mental escapist souls become the happiest and healthiest among us.
Their active minds almost activate a complete life change. It’s like a magic spell that lifts them out of their long rut and transports them to better places, a better total experience with life with the best self coming out to lead it all.
Follow suit. All the clouds that hung over you, will melt them away as the new sun that rises in your mind burns them away with great scenes you love.
Which speaks of one undeniable truth of the whole process – there is nothing to lose and everything to gain.
It could end up helping you turn the corner, turn the page somewhere in your life, or finally take your turn at being happier than you ever, well, thought. Imagine that.
It’s not mental escapism, it’s mental freedom!!
References – Fortune.com – Hallmark’s catalog of 300+ Christmas movies.
Healthdata.org – Global mental disorders have nearly doubled since 1990 (published 21.5.26).
