
How to not get Frustrated [when dealing with] Others
In this episode, Kris Simpson explains how to not get frustrated with others with a comical story of how he “didn’t know what he didn’t know” and illustrates a novel method of relieving frustration when we’re dealing with other people. Listen now!
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You don’t know what you don’t know
Have you ever discovered something that was in your blind spot and after it was revealed thought to yourself, “how did I overlook that, it was so obvious?”
There’s an old saying that “you don’t know what you don’t know” which is such a true statement.
I remember many years ago; I was taking my uncle through the gym that I own and asking him for advice on things he that needed improvements.
We went into the change room, and I immediately saw what I had been looking at and which had been frustrating me about others for years; a bunch of used paper towels piled up just inside the door.
I had been complaining to anyone who would listen about what I thought was one of the most disrespectful acts; littering.
Moreover, this was unhygienic, which fuelled my frustration even more.
So my uncle was the next person of many that I would unleash my rant on which had become a well-rehearsed script.
The next thing he did, I will remember forever.
I didn’t have a chance to finish my complaining because he moved one of the garbage cans right beside the door.
I was stunned.
The solution was as simple as understanding people’s human nature.
The gym members were using paper towels to cover the door handle so their hands wouldn’t touch it.
Then they would discard the paper towel onto the floor, only because there wasn’t a garbage can readily available and there was no turning back after they opened the door.
Instead of seeing the obvious solution, I had stayed stuck in my perception of how things and people should be.
The garbage can is still there to this day and acts as a reminder for me to practice the art of seeing things through the eyes of others – so I may see solutions and compromises – rather than becoming frustrated with others.
It is then that we can stop complaining about all the things we don’t like and focus on how we can make things right for everyone.
Inspire to Aspire,
-Kris
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Full Transcript
Transcript to follow:
Welcome to the all inclusive lifestyle show where you will learn the secrets for cultivating energy and restoring balance and living in all inclusive lifestyle. And here’s your host, author of the bestseller, the all inclusive diet, Kris j Simpson. Hey y’all,
it’s me KJ and welcome to another episode of the all inclusive lifestyle show. Thank you. Gratitude for being here, for listening, for tuning in, for allowing me to do what I have to do every day. This is my purpose, to inspire others to aspire. So hopefully I’m doing a good job at that. Give me some feedback. I think everyone needs a patented back. Even poor old me over here. Let me know how I’m doing. Let me know if you’d like to have something addressed. Maybe you have a question that I can look at. You know that I talk about life and everything in life, how we sleep, how we relax, how we eat, how we think and how we feel, how we live. So reach out. Let me know. I’ll look forward to hearing from you and responding to, you can start today’s show a with a question.
Have you ever discovered something that was in your blind spot and after it was revealed, you thought to yourself like, how did I overlook that? It was so obvious. There’s that saying, it says that, uh, you, uh, you don’t know what you don’t know and you do know what you don’t know, think it goes something like that. And this is my interpretation of that. So we know what we don’t know. For example, I do not know how to fly a plane, although that is on my bucket list. We’d love to do that. I will do that some day soon. But right now I do not know how to fly a plane. You would not want to get into a plane with me. That would be very dangerous. Do not allow me to influence you to do that. So there is also things that I, I don’t know.
I don’t know. They are completely in my blind spot. And it’s those kinds of things when they’re revealed and typically the reveal to me under strange circumstances, uh, one of which I’ll tell you today, a quick story here. So I own a business. I own a gym. Uh, those that are, you have been following me, um, know that, uh, I’ve had that gym for some time and I also have my beloved uncle who is over in China right now. And uh, back when he was living here in Toronto or Canada, he came by to my gym and he was giving me a devices. He’s a essentially my business consultant and he’s always been there for me, uh, since I’ve been an adolescent in, in well into every sort of big life, big life moment that I’ve ever had. He’s always been by my side. So he used to come around and give advice a about the gym and how we could make improvements.
So we were doing our little tour and uh, I had my pencil and paper out and was just writing down notes about the things that he could see that, that I couldn’t see that were essentially in my blind spot. So we went into the change room and right when I opened that door there was a big pile of dirty paper towel, hand towels that that people members had essentially just thrown down on the inside of the men’s change room door and I could feel the blood rushing to my head. The frustration, the resentment, the anger of seeing that day after day, year after year and doing plenty of complaining about it. In fact, I think I had a well-rehearsed to script for anyone that was interested in listening to and I think I’d run out of people that were willing to listen to it cause I was a broken record.
I’d never stopped talking about this frustrating unhygienic disrespectful thing in my belief system anyways of of littering, especially if it’s, if it’s something of, of hygiene, like a, a paper towel that you would clean your hands with. I, I just, I couldn’t wrap my head around someone so blatantly or seemingly so obviously throwing a used paper towel that you cleaned your hands with after you, you’re leaving the washroom on the f I’m going back into the rant RNA. Okay. I’m going to break that pattern. There we go. I’m going right back there. How about that? Hey, that groove is still there. If I want to jump back in, but I’m not going to a, let’s get back to this story here. So of course I lay in on my uncle and um, I give him that, that big well-rehearsed rant. Uh, my uncle, uh, sorta just looks at me with that twinkle in his eye and uh, sort of a half smile, like he knows, um, what I don’t know, essentially, um, understands and, uh, is willing to help me.
So, uh, thank goodness that I have a, a mentor. Um, my uncle Tony in my life, if you’re listening, Uncle Tony, thank you. Love you. Um, so he decides to do something that, uh, is still in my impression, a bull mind today. He actually moved a garbage can that was a away from the door. The inside the door was within the washroom somewhere and moved it right beside the inside of the door. And I remember I was in a state of shock. I didn’t know what to say. It was so obvious that this this year long problem could have easily been solved if I had have just taken a step back from, you know, all, all of the, the reasons and beliefs that I had of how people should act and behave. And that kind of behavior is just so disrespectful and inhumane. And how can someone do that to taking a look at why would they do that?
What, what is in their nature and understanding that, you know, our nature is our nature, that we’re not all that different. And really maybe all that makes us different is just our experiences. But if we can get right down to the root of our nature, we can really start to understand why people do the things that they do. And what I finally saw was the reason for all of these years, why these men were throwing down their paper towels on the inside of the door was simply to open the door. They were using the paper towels to, to open the door so they didn’t have to touch the door handle because that to them and their belief was very unhygienic and dirty and might lead to them getting sick, etc. Etc. So of course when you open that door with the paper towel and if there’s no garbage can there to put it in immediately, then that door has to close and you need to throw your paper towel on the floor because there’s not a garbage can there to throw it into.
Wow, what a revelation completely in my blind spot and just hit me like that. Um, that garbage can is still there today. It’s there a for a purpose obviously, uh, to, uh, to make sure that, uh, I can keep my blood pressure nominal. Uh, but also it’s, it’s there to remind me, or at least it reminds me every day of, of how I need to take a pause, take a breath, and maybe even close my eyes and maybe even get into some sort of relaxing state. Maybe it’s meditation, whatever you wanna call it. Just allow my brain to really dig deep and really try to understand people. And really all I need to do is try to get past all of the belief systems that I’ve built up over all the years that we’ve all built up and, and try to take another look at it rather than being attached to it, separate from it.
So we can really challenge that belief. And in doing so with that separation, there’s a certain amount of liberation that allows us to see things that we could not see before the blinders come off. And now we do know what we didn’t know before. A lot of times we need that guiding hand, we need that mentor. We need to be in that group of people that are perhaps, you know, suffering in a sense of, of the same sort of, of, of dilemma of, of things. They just can’t seem to get their head around. So other people in obviously a higher power can also allow us just to break through that mold that we’ve created of how things have to be. They always have to be the way that we want them to be. Uh, and that ends up being very frustrating. It brings on a lot of suffering.
It’s needless suffering, like most suffering that we go through and there is a way out, there is a way to liberation and um, it really feels refreshing to know that we can all solve those perhaps month long year long lifelong problems of, of thinking essentially by trying to see things in a different perspective in someone else’s perspective and making decisions. The work for everyone that don’t just work for us because if they work for everyone, they are gonna work for us because we need all of those people. We need to get along with those people because if we don’t, then life is going to be really crappy. We can all base our relation, our life story on all of our relationships and the quality there of so take some time the next time that you get frustrated, resentful, you’ve heard that song before. It’s an Oldie, it’s not a golden oldie. It has no value at all. It’s, it’s not serving you at all. Take a look at that or ask somebody else to take a look at it for you. Keep an open mind. Keep willing, keep honest with yourself because that’s how we do things around your, it’s an acronym that stands for honesty, openness, and willing. How is how we can break through to the other side, to the side where we can experience more freedom and continue to inspire to aspire.
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