Are you stressed by what’s happening or how you see what’s happening?

Michelle Grice posted about being content with the chaos as a major goal she is working on. Instead of feeling out of control and powerless with the chaos that comes with running a business from home with young children, she is learning to accept the chaos as part of her life. The acceptance obviously doesn’t remove the hassles of deadlines being 2interrupted by sick kids, etc, but it does reduce the stress and discomfort Michelle feels about such hassles.

It is an interesting point – our attitude is a major factor in how stressful we find situations. And it can also have a flow on effect. Continuing with the work-from-home-mum example, if she is overwhelmed with work she will get stressed and be irritable when her children want her attention. On the other hand, if this Mum accepts she will be interrupted and is less stressed by it then she is likely to deal with the children more positively. And that makes the children more relaxed (and stops her feeling terrible about negative interactions later!)

Like most people, I understand Michelle’s feelings of chaos; I do work from home with young children for a start and it can be chaotic and overwhelming at times. Having to do lists is one thing that always helps me create some order from the chaos.

Further  than to do lists, writing a list of what is chaotic and stressful has a number of advantages:

• you get a lot of it out of your head so there is psace to think!
• seeing it written down may show there is less that you thought
• it allows you to be more objective and set priorities
• it gives you a list of areas to work on – maybe once you see it written you may realise you DO have the power to change something

What other ideas do you have about changing your perception of chaos? Or about changing some of the chaos itself?