I love rit­u­als.  Rit­u­als keep me orga­nized and happy–the two things I cov­et the most.  I am obsessed with order and effi­cien­cy, and in remov­ing clut­ter from my life. Our homes, cars, wal­lets, clos­ets are thoughts that come to mind when we think about clut­ter. How­ev­er, the worst type of clut­ter is found up here (I’m point­ing to my big brain). Have you thought about this?

If you’re any­thing like me, you know what it’s like to have many loves in your life. I’m curi­ous about many things, career paths and ideas.  I was liv­ing in a night­mare until I made the deci­sion to become a min­i­mal­ist.  I have found that rit­u­als and healthy rou­tines work for me.  I have rit­u­als for every­thing.  I have week­ly morn­ing rit­u­als.  I have week­end morn­ing rit­u­als.  I have mid-day rit­u­als.  I have end-of-day rit­u­als. I have Sat­ur­day morn­ing rit­u­als.  I have after-din­ner rit­u­als.  I have before-I-go-to-bed rit­u­als.  I have worst-case sce­nario rit­u­als.  Rit­u­als are an essen­tial part of my sys­tem; they keep order, struc­ture, and things in place.  After a while these rit­u­als become a way of life. They become sys­tem­at­ic, and this my friends is pure gold.

Let’s dis­cuss my Worst-Case Sce­nario Rit­u­al:  Your meet­ing went bad.  You blew your inter­view.  You failed an exam. You found out your boyfriend cheat­ed on you.  You lost your purse.  You chipped a nail, what­ev­er.  Think of some­thing awful that hap­pened to you.

Okay, like most Amer­i­cans I first go through the motions.  I spend a few min­utes sob­bing, scream­ing, kick­ing, and com­plain­ing.  I point fin­gers: you, you, and you!  It’s nev­er me; it’s nev­er my fault, not me, not in the infan­til (child­like) phase I refer to as the “vent” phase.

I usu­al­ly call some­one I real­ly trust and I vent–but only for a few min­utes.  I only vent to poor Ter­rance and he knows that part of my rit­u­al is to not let me dwell on any­thing neg­a­tive for more than 5 min­utes.  After that, he is to polite­ly and calm­ly (I might still be irate) ease me out of the vent phase.

Once this is over and I have calmed down, I ask myself five ques­tions:

1. What are 20 things I am grate­ful for now?
2. Is this life-threat­en­ing?
3. Did pup­pies die or will die because of this onslaught?
4. What is the worst-case sce­nario?
5. Will this mat­ter in six months?

Let me tell you some­thing, friends.  If you’re hav­ing a crap­py day, secret-shifters are like Oreo cook­ies, just per­fect.  When I’m feel­ing inse­cure, dis­il­lu­sioned, and unap­pre­ci­at­ed I force myself to think of 20 things I’m grate­ful for.  If you’re some­one who lives with grat­i­tude in your heart you should be able to come up with dozens of thoughts in less than a minute.  Don’t believe me?  Try it.  🙂

Am I going to die from this?  The chances are, no-prob­a­bly not.  If so, I move on to the next ques­tion.  Did pup­pies die because of it?  The answer is usu­al­ly no.

The 4th ques­tion is a real­ly, real­ly good one because it forces us to use the Glass Half-Full phi­los­o­phy.  Think about this for a moment. Could things have gone worse? Ah, yeah.  Things could always be worse.  Seri­ous­ly, this ques­tion if opti­mistic and can help you with the first ques­tion.  So this one is easy; let’s move on to the final ques­tion.

Will this even mat­ter in six months?  No.  Even after the death of a failed romance, we should all be able to smile after six months.  Remem­ber when Big left Car­rie at the altar in Sex and the City, the movie? Car­rie thought she was going to die.  Then pris­sy Char­lotte shit­ted her pants.  Car­rie and her friends all had a good laugh, and you will too. Even Char­lotte moved on!

Okay, time to reflect.  This is the most impor­tant step in your attempt to free your mind (the rest will fol­low).  Now that you know you are not going to die, oth­ers aren’t going to die, things could have gone a lot worse…now is time to point that per­fect­ly man­i­cured nail at you, you, and you.

Ask your­self the fol­low­ing:  What can I do right away to rem­e­dy the sit­u­a­tion?  How can I save-face?  What is under my con­trol?  What won’t I do next time? What will I do next time?  What can I do bet­ter?  What have I learned?

I use major and minor mishaps to learn and grow.  After I’ve been through my entire rit­u­al I move on and vow not to talk about it ever again because I val­ue my hap­pi­ness. And I know that if I dwell on it some more, I will only make the mat­ter worse. This is a sys­tem I use to stay hap­py and calm.  This is my Worst-Case Sce­nario Rit­u­al.  This is what keeps my life dra­ma-free.  This is what keeps my mind orga­nized and moti­vat­ed to focus on all the good in my life.

What are some things you have done in a sim­i­lar sit­u­a­tion?  Keep your life and mind orga­nized.  Use the TRAF Sys­tem.  That is, either toss the thought, refer it to some­one else, act on it (which is what we did) or file it away.  After I went through all the steps and I got the best out of this awful situation–such as a learn­ing oppor­tu­ni­ty, it is now time to toss this bad boy and move on to the next meet­ing, boyfriend, or inter­view!

No one gets away with­out a blun­der (or sev­er­al) in a life­time!  It’s inevitable, every­body gets to play the fool.  You can’t escape this. These are pure unadul­ter­at­ed facts of life.  Now that we got this out of the way, now you can dust it off your shoul­ders and move on, my friend.  I wish you well in your quest to a sim­pli­fied lifestyle and it all starts with your cabeza (mind).

Xoxo,

Irís