This morning in a meeting I reacted in an uncharacteristic way. I’ve noticed myself doing that a few times in meetings when I feel frustrated about a lack of ability to contribute or make a difference in something, when I know I could provide some help but am basically prevented in doing such by a lack of time to devote to it. I find that really frustrating.
Then I got back to my email and got an email from DailyOM, a site which sends thoughts to consider daily, on a number of areas. Today’s topic was “irritation”.
I thought, “hey, how timely!”
But then I read the email and it’s all about how one should not react to irritation but take it as an opportunity to grow as a person by essentially noticing it and not reacting. It talked about “remaining centered and awake even when uncomfortable”. Which, okay, fine, that’s a good thing, sure. But it’s so NOT the real point, I think. Is that really growth? I sure don’t think so.
I use irritation like a sign on the highway. I notice I’m feeling irritated, it sweeps past me, and I say “hey, what the hell was that?” Why did I react to that? What was underneath that emotion? Why did this particular thing evoke in me this uncharacteristic reaction? Are there some actions I need to take that I’m not taking, that would bring myself into truer alignment with my beliefs?
This to me is I think the real path to enlightenment when it comes to being irritated. Not just “remaining centered and awake”. I treat “being moved” in the same manner. If I’m watching a movie, and I feel moved, and I don’t understand why, it creates an opportunity for reflection and analysis. (Unless I’m watching a movie on a plane, in which case I get moved by every. frickin. little. thing. Crazy!)
Anyway. So now I’m thinking about why I got irritated today. But I think I know why. The question is: what to do about it? Enlightenment is a wonderful thing, but it’s basically a useless exercise unless there’s some action. Right?
Irritation
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6 responses to “Irritation”
If I were a deep, reflecting type of person (and I’m not), I’d say that perhaps the act of reflecting on the irritation and how you react to it – is itself a kind of action taken. (i.e. when they say “by essentially noticing it and not reacting” it’s impossible. By noticing it you HAVE reacted. A kind of mental Heisenberg principle 🙂 The outcome is that you can better recognize it next time.
But then I’m not a deep guy. Personally, I think that alcohol is indeed the answer.
🙂
That’s what you get for trying to download your wisdom from http://www.dailyom.com . You are an animal — why the taboo against getting mad? It’s part of what makes us human. I personally don’t buy the Buddhist/Christian philosophy of just letting annoyances pile up. Most people don’t want to be annoying, and if you tell them they’re annoying, politely or no, most often they’ll stop, problem solved!
I hate long business trips. Even chick flicks make me cry when I’m on them.
While I’m no expert on the concept, what you are describing sounds a lot like mindfulness to me. In mindfulness the ‘point’ is to stay in the moment and to observe in a non-judgemental way one’s own emotions as they bubble up to the surface. In other words, just be. Once you begin to analyze or attempt to explain or understand the emotion being experienced, you’ve crossed the line from ‘being’ into ‘doing’, and you’ve gone too far.
I do believe it is possible to avoid reacting to negative emotions if one is practiced at mindfulness. Instead, take on the role of observer and learn to become one with them instead of fighting to understand or resolve them. Practice, as with any discipline, is key to success with it.
Or, Mark, perhaps you just witnessed someone doing something stupid for the umteenth time and you are just fed up. Nothing wrong with that at all. If you observe someone doing the same stupid thing over and over again and it impacts you, why not speak up? I’m with John on this one: speaking up and letting them know they are an idiot may be the best thing you can do for them!
That, or Kim is right and alcohol is really the answer.
Normally I’m in the make your point, but don’t jump all over people category but there are those instances where I bite into my coworkers pretty hard. Usually it is after the same thing has been addressed a bunch of times and I get that “Is anyone listening?” feeling.
As for becoming enlightened, there are definitely lessons you can learn from others but I think it just looks more professional to not let yourself become irritated. When I snap usually I end up apologizing to people later and typically they say something like “holy crap, at least someone said something, this is the fifth time we’ve discussed this”, so I quickly discover that I wasn’t alone, I just was the first one to speak up.
In the end someone has to force action otherwise you are setting yourself up for the same irritation later. If you can address it before you become irritated great but as long as it doesn’t become recognized as one of your personality traits (meaning it happens probably less than once every couple of weeks or month) you are probably fine and it isn’t damaging. If you do it more often then eventually you might become known as someone who is easily irritated, which in most cases is not desirable.
Normally I’m in the make your point, but don’t jump all over people category but there are those instances where I bite into my coworkers pretty hard. Usually it is after the same thing has been addressed a bunch of times and I get that “Is anyone listening?” feeling.
As for becoming enlightened, there are definitely lessons you can learn from others but I think it just looks more professional to not let yourself become irritated. When I snap usually I end up apologizing to people later and typically they say something like “holy crap, at least someone said something, this is the fifth time we’ve discussed this”, so I quickly discover that I wasn’t alone, I just was the first one to speak up.
In the end someone has to force action otherwise you are setting yourself up for the same irritation later. If you can address it before you become irritated great but as long as it doesn’t become recognized as one of your personality traits (meaning it happens probably less than once every couple of weeks or month) you are probably fine and it isn’t damaging. If you do it more often then eventually you might become known as someone who is easily irritated, which in most cases is not desirable.