My neighbor is a lovely man.  He takes our recycling bins in when we are out of town.  He has helped us find contractors for house projects.  On more than one occasion, I have also seen him helping other neighbors.  He is a great guy.  But he has one flaw.  He is a perfectionist with his driveway.  No matter what the season, he ensures his driveway is pristine.  He blows grass off in the summer and leaves off in the fall.  And in the winter, we see him outside every time a half inch of snow accumulates, no matter the temperature or if the snow is still falling, to remove every flake.  Most days I’d rather eat off his driveway than my kitchen floor!  The driveway looks great, but we all think he is a little bit obsessive.

Photo by M1ke

In the last few weeks, the Chicago suburbs have been blessed with quite a pile of snow.  And without fail my neighbor was out there every hour or so constantly removing any trace of snow.  He not only does his driveway, sidewalk, and steps, but he ensures that every ounce of snow is removed from the street surrounding his drive.  On the other hand when I worked at an office and had to be out of the house at 8:00 am, the snow piled up all day long until I got home.  Then I would struggle to remove the two, three, or five inches of snow that accumulated while I was away.  But I learned something now that I work from home.  Shoveling snow a few times a day means that the amount of snow shoveled each time is smaller making the weight of the snow lighter and easier to manage, and makes it easier to remove any ice patches forming due to tire treads or footprints.  I may be spending more time removing the snow, but the actual effort of removing it is much, much, much easier.

Photo by Mattox

Often times we let our pain, frustration, stress, guilt, or anxiety grow and grow until they are overwhelming.  Then we finally get a massage, take some herbs, get some counseling, or go on a retreat.  Our efforts alleviate our pain, but it does not remove all of it.  There is just too much to go through.  We let it pile up and now it is too heavy and large to deal with in one sitting.  We need to work extra hard to get our emotions back to an acceptable level, back to a level where we can function.  But we have not totally cleared the problem.  Like trying to clear eight inches of snow after a long day at the office, the process is difficult, seems overwhelming, each shovel-full is heavy and hard to throw, and we are left with patches that we can not remove.  But imagine if you spent a few minutes every day clearing away your anxiety, fear, stress, and frustration.  It would not have time to build into something unmanageable.

The key to a clear mind, as learned from a clean driveway, is:

Don’t Let It Pile Up

Work at every day.  Don’t wait until you have a nervous breakdown or a major medical issue to force you to examine your life.  Address issues as they come up.

Small Loads Make Easy Work

Working on things a little bit at a time makes it easier.  Instead of having a major issue to deal with, work on things when they are small.  They take less time and are easier to dispel.  Waiting until they grow larger makes the work to remove them harder.

Be Consistent

Even when things are terrific, take the time to examine what is going on.  That little, insignificant annoyance today could become something greater over time.  Remove it before it has time to grow.  Take the time every day to examine your mental state even if you are feeling blissful.

Photo by leilahh

A benefit of staying on top of your emotional well-being is that you also feel much better.  Shoveling away the anxiety every day will keep you from hitting rock bottom.  Each day will be better because there are no issues lingering from the day before.  You will be starting from a clean slate, which is another benefit.  If your mind and emotions are clean, it becomes much easier to spot potential issues as they stand out in contrast to the rest of your peaceful well-being.

This week in Chicago looks to be wonderful.  Mild temperatures are promised which may help remove some of the piled up snow.  But things can change.  The projected rain at the end of the week could easily become ten inches of snow.  So I am being prepared.  I am ready to take the time I need to keep the snow from becoming a larger issue than it needs to be.

Are you ready to keep your emotional worries from becoming larger than they need to be?

My husband and I were very lucky to receive a Wii® as a gift this year.  We were very excited as it would give us another option at night besides activities that center on sitting.  The first night my husband set up the game, we created our Mii’s (Missy and DanDan), and we bowled for hours.  Man, we were unstoppable!  When the next night rolled around we were excited to hit the lanes.  But the strikes were few and far between.  You see the more one plays Wii, the more difficult it gets.  The almost perfect roll that yielded a strike the first night was now leaving the seven-ten split.

Being who I am, I tried to improve my game by being more and more precise with my signature move.  I can’t say I was making amazing progress but I was determined that improving each element of the move would get me back to strike after strike.  Persistence is my motto and I was willing to play game after game making minor corrections each time.  My husband on the other hand was not as patient (at least not in this matter).  He began to get angry at the game, at himself, and at Nintendo for ever conceiving of such a diabolical pastime.  But then my brilliant husband came up with a wonderful idea.  Being the engineer that he is, he set up a test lab where we could safely try out new moves, monitor different rolls, and review the results without affecting our standings.

Luzer and Missy

We created two new Mii’s for ourselves, Bruzer and Luzer.  My Luzer scores would not affect my Missy standings.  It was amazing how freeing this was.  Part of my meticulousness was my intention to not have a bad game therefore hurting my overall standings.  But it also did not allow me to try new things.  I felt I had to use the same throw as the night before because I knew at least I would have acceptable games.  Trying something new might result in a bad game and I was not willing to risk it.  But what I forgot about was that trying new things may also result in a better score.  As Luzer I was free to throw from the other side of the lane.  I worked on my curve ball.  I tried this throw and that throw.  Now when there was a gutter ball, I could laugh.  I was just trying and learning.  Instead of frustration, difficult spares were now an opportunity to grow.  My overall game improved because I was free to try new things and to make mistakes.

It was not until after a few games using our impostor Mii’s that I noticed something else.  We were having fun again!  There was a lightness to my mood and I experienced the joy of play.  As Missy I was concentrating hard on each movement and feeling very rigid, serious, and frustrated.  There was no fun in the game and there was really not any freedom in my actions.  By taking on that second Wii persona, I loosened up.  I was able to smile, laugh, and release the tension in my body and mind.  By releasing the tension, my movements and abilities improved.  When I released the pressure of perfection, I was free mentally and physically.  It wasn’t that I was completely free from responsibility, I was still trying to get all the pins down, but there was not the added pressure of my own psyche attacking me if my scores were not a certain level.

It got me to thinking.

Where in our lives could we benefit from being a different person if only for a day?  What could putting on a new persona or just releasing the restrictive parts of our current persona provide for us?

How could letting go of our focus on outcomes allow us to try new things so that we can learn and grow?  How far could we reach when we are just having fun versus being ever focused on our progress toward the end result?

How often are we so focused on one way of doing things that we do not see the easy solution in front of us?

We are entering a new year and a new decade.  What in your life is working?  What is not?  For those things you would like to improve, try stepping outside of yourself and having fun finding different possibilities and solutions.  Sometimes jumping out of our comfort zone can expose us to new ways to grow and excel.  Release your expectations, stop focusing on the outcome, and just enjoy the moment you are in.

Have fun trying, learning, and growing in 2010!