The Darkest Hour...

"Oh CRAP!"

For my pal Dave, that exclamation was the first sign of trouble. The sound came from his wife, as she sprung from the bed and headed for the kitchen, seemingly without even touching the ground. It jolted Dave out of Morpheus' embrace, a job usually done more gradually by his multi-tiered alarm system. One (sufficiently loud and exceedingly annoying) alarm clock goes off at four am, supported by two cellphone alarms (at 4:10 & 4:15), both following a strict two snooze protocol.

Dave knows that if his butt isn't out of bed before the third snooze, he's toast. He hits the road by five-thirty or he endures two hours of traffic, guaranteed. (And in his world, there is nothing that Dave hates more than traffic.)

He reached for his cellphone, groggily noticing the faint rays of sunlight streaming through the curtains and asked himself, "Jeezanages, what's the time ?"

It was twenty minutes to six.

"Five...firetrucking...forty???", Dave questioned, in disbelief. As his brain started processing his predicament, this was the point where his panic would usually set in.

After all, it's wasn't just his departure for work that was delayed, but also the whole sequence of events that were to follow! The thoughts flooded his mind: that deadline that he had planned to get in early to tackle, before the arrival of the two auditors from his regional head office...whom he wasn't sure that building security had yet been notified about...and whose daily schedule of meetings he was still to arrange...not to mention finding a free office space for them to work...plus getting his daughter Kristy's homework printed before dropping her off at school at seven...the whirlwind of anxiety, worry and stress was picking up speed...

Yet, that day Dave did something...different.

Before getting off the bed, he took a moment and spoke to that storm brewing in his mind. "Ok..I can't be late twice.", he said to himself. "No matter how fast we get ready, its going to be a long trip...so I'll just load up the car deck with my favorite mp3s, and relaxify myself. As for everything else I had planned, l'll just keep calm, and go with the flow. Everything will probably get done, one way or the other, and even if it doesn't, this day will come to an end."

Then, Dave walked out of his bedroom and calmly got ready for work. When Kristy was dressed, he kissed his wife goodbye, and Dave enjoyed two hours of his favorite tunes on the morning drive, while she took a nap.

Did everything go smoothly that day? Nope.
Did Dave finish all the tasks he woke up with on his mind? Certainly not.
Yet, somehow...things still got done.

Yes, Kristy was an hour late for school...sure, the meeting schedule for his auditors ended up being somewhat "fluid" that day, but they all happened!  On the other hand, that deadline he thought was the following day?  Dave realised that It was actually due ten days later!  

So, the sky didn't come crashing down, as Dave may have feared, and all things considered, he had to say it was a pretty good day.  I'm sure we've all seen it turn out differently, when we allowed that one "bad" event to throw our entire day off. 

We would argue with our partner and the kids, lament the fact that despite the plethora of technology that you bought for them, they can't seem to grasp the basic operation of an alarm clock...anxiously cut in and out of traffic, cussing the idiots cruising in the "fast" lane....

and arriving at work two hours later, completely stressed and frustrated. 

Allowed, I say, because I put it to you that it is within our control. No, not the events themselves, but how we react to them. I'm suggesting that a large part of what made the difference to Dave, was how he chose to interpret that situation, choosing to swim with this tide rather than against it, all while recognising that the tides...change.

Life situations are temporary, and maybe what determines how we experience the situation is just how we choose to think about it. Or to put it another way, the darkest hour lasts only 60 minutes, and that's precisely when your candle can shine brighter than the sun.

Anyway, that's my bullshit.

As a bonus, watch this hilarious demonstration of the power of perspective!

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