Fear: Deal with it

Who knows what the status of the meme is when you read this, a part of me hopes memes aren't a thing anymore.  Anywhose, a relatively important trait I hope you learn is to deal with things; I'm also fairly worried this trait might go unobtained.  This is one of those areas your mother and I differ greatly on, but more concerningly, due to the nature of this trait, it is quite possible you won't be given the opportunity to really be exposed to it.  And because of the reason behind this post, the tense in which it is written is wacky (more so than normal, yikes).  I'm expressing a fear I have about a lesson you should learn, but you're probably reading this long after the time that lesson could be taught.

You see, "dealing with it" can be applied to almost all areas your life, and in 90% of situations it's helpful which is why I believe it to be so important.  Is the temperature a little too warm or cool to be comfortable?  If you're good with dealing with it, it won't matter and you can still do whatever you need/want (be it chores or even playing); also, you will save money by not having to artificially change the climate.  Dealing with it is also at the core of not being the source of negativity for other people.  Many times and places, with friends or strangers, only one thing can happen and it won't please everyone; someone is not getting what they want.  Someone's going to be, to some level, "unhappy".  If you can deal with it, you'll be the least unhappy, and you can gain some joy out of knowing that it was directly due to your sacrifice that you allowed someone else to be happy.

I'm sort of starting to lose my train of thought here because there are just SO many aspects of life that dealing with it is both healthy and helpful for both yourself, and for those around you.  I'd love to give you more examples, but there are just too many flying around my head right now.  Hopefully you can glean enough from the examples I gave.  I might add more at a later time.

As I alluded to, though, dealing with it isn't 100% "good".  Dealing with everything is a doorway to being a doormat and having everyone walk all over you.  But, just because you can deal with a situation that isn't what you wanted, doesn't mean you have to put yourself in that situation repeatedly.  If you're with a "friend" who constantly does whatever he/she wants and you're constantly having to deal with it, maybe they're not that good of a friend and you should stop hanging out with them.  It's that whole "Do X to me once, shame on you; do X to me twice, shame on me," where X is something you don't like.  Of course, I'm more along the lines of allowing the person to do it 3 or 4 times before it's my fault.  Also, dealing it with can lead to things like being uninspired, unmotivated, or unclean.  You might not mind dealing with having a sink full of dirty dishes all the time; that's not good.  BUT... don't confuse dealing with it with laziness or bad habits.

Dealing with it means that you're not getting your way when you could be getting your way, and you're not complaining about it.  Waiting for Christmas even though you can hardly contain yourself?  That's NOT dealing with it because A) there's nothing you can do to change anything, 2) it's definitely coming.  Letting your friend get the last piece of cake even though you hadn't had any yet, but complaining about it the whole time?  That's NOT dealing it because you're complaining.  Constantly having to tip toe through your bedroom because those spots are the only clean ones?  You're not dealing with the mess, you're either being lazy and not picking up after yourself or you truly just don't mind; either way, you're not "dealing with it."

What I'm afraid of, though, is that as I mentioned, due to the nature of dealing with it, I don't know if you'll be able to pick that up from us.  I "deal with" a lot of stuff; your mother, notsomuch.  E.G., I would deal with a warm/cool car/house (let me be clear, it's not that I'm perfectly comfortable, it's that I'm not dying of heat, so I deal with it in order to save $$$), but your mom has a narrow temperature range she's willing to put up with before turning on the A/C or heater.  There's nothing wrong with that, but if she turns on the A/C or heater, then it's on for everyone (or at the very least it's on for her, so now we're paying for it; me getting the benefit of the A/C doesn't change how much it costs).  The point is, you're not going to be told to deal with it as much as I was as a kid because your mom is more likely to make sure your comfortable.  You might say, "Ehhh, I'm sooooo hungry," (even though you ate just 5 hours ago to the point that you wouldn't eat any more) to which I would want to reply, "You'll have to wait."  But your mom will probably convince me to stop and get something to eat now because she herself is hungry and not willing to deal with it.  Thus, you didn't have to deal with it and that lesson is lost.

Hopefully in further posts, if I mention an example, I'll saying something along the lines of "And if you're good at dealing with it, it wouldn't be a problem."