Last week we had a couple days of no kids at school, which gave us some much needed time to organize and prepare. If you don't know, I work in a special needs preschool as my day job, in a room of 3 and 4 year olds. Right now we are doing construction and building. Well, a fellow team member and I were in our glory getting ready for the kids to come back. We decorated the furniture in our pretend centre so it looked a crane, complete with a wrecking ball to knock down towers. We printed pictures of heavy equipment and put them up around the room. We made construction barriers, grey play dough to look like mortar... we worked hard. Today the teacher came back from her conference and didn't even really say anything about the work we had done. I was pretty upset.
Why was I so mad about this? The kids would love the things we had created for them with or without her praise, I knew we had worked hard and I was proud of what we had done. My happiness was dependent on her approval, even thought it changed none of the outcome. I stopped (after venting to a coworker or two) and was curious about why I was feeling that way. It passed, the children arrived and everything was fine. And at lunch she told us how great the room looked and thanked us.
This week we are talking about santosha, or contentment. This morning I was not content with not receiving praise, and my own need for someone else's approval made me unhappy. I alone was responsible for my own anger and sadness in that moment. When you place your own happiness in someone else's actions or deeds, you make yourself helpless in your own life. We place so much value on ourselves that we start to assume that other people are doing things intentionally just to make us mad. For example, in traffic my normally lovely husband changes. He feels like everyone is out to get him, they don't want him to pass them, they are slowing him down on purpose... and I really don't think that he ever crossed any of those people's minds. We become trapped in cycles of emotional disturbances and they seem normal, but when you are constantly in this state you can not find contentment.
One of the simplest ways to find a quick way to contentment is to use gratitude. They go hand in hand. In a moment of frustration or worry can you look around you and find something to be grateful for? This morning I maybe should have been grateful that I was not the one in the car accident that made me late for work, and grateful that I knew we were well prepared for the children to come and play today. I would have felt better all morning. This week challenge yourself to pause in moments of "emotional disturbance". Be curious as to why you are upset. Look for something to be grateful in the moment. No one else is responsible for how you feel, you are the only one who can change it.
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