Let me start off with the fact that I know that this is South Florida, I understand that we have a catastrophic hurricane threatening our state in the next few days and I am aware of the fear that has descended upon our area. I get it. People are in bad moods, they are thinking negatively and basically hating life right now. I know. I sympathize. It’s fine.
Now that that is covered; I like to think that I am a pretty civil person, I try to smile at people and let them know I appreciate the fact that they are alive. Today was no different, in fact because of the current situation with Irma – I made the decision when I went out today to be more kind and understanding and try to brighten people’s day by smiling and being kind.
Okay, so I go in to send out a package and the lady behind the desk made me feel about 2 inches tall. The rude, condescending ‘I’d like to spit in your face’ attitude and demeanor she had towards me caught me completely off guard and no matter how kind and understanding I tried to be with her -she would just spit something mean right back out at me. Whoa. I kept my composure and wished her a nice day as I left – to which I received another nasty response. Honestly, I don’t care what is going on in the world at this moment, that kind of behavior is just unnecessary.
Now I am not disrespecting her by any means – I have no idea what is going on in her life. For all I know she may have just experienced the worst week of her life and now suddenly we have a hurricane coming and threatening her home, family and job. I don’t know. But what I do know is that had I been anyone else, or been in a bad mental zone when I came into contact with her – that could have gotten very ugly very quickly. Now, because of the leadership training I have been involved with as well as the Twelve Step work that I have done – I am able to handle these types of encounters without losing my temper or letting it ruin my day. However – it still ticked me off.
But it was also a bit of a wake up call for me in regards to attitude.
We have all heard the sayings like:
Attitude is everything, Attitude of gratitude, or at least we have heard our parents say “You better knock it off with that attitude!â€
I really realized with this situation just how much our attitudes effect the people around us. Because this woman was behaving this way (Not just with me, but with everyone in the lobby) who really knows how far the ripples of her bad behavior really went? I mean, obviously it affected me, or I wouldn’t be writing about it. But what about the young father in front of me in line? Or the elderly woman behind me? How will that woman’s attitude effect the rest of their day?
I am really not trying to preach, I just wanted to share this. Right now, we are enduring many difficult things in our world, our country, our states and our homes – but I feel that is all the more reason for us to be a light. To be kind instead of rude, to wear a smile instead of a scowl. Instead of adding to the reasons someone may have for being in a bad mood, why don’t we help relieve some of that stress by looking them in the eye and just giving them a genuine smile? It doesn’t cost us a thing – in fact I have found that when I do that and I receive a genuine smile back – it uplifts me too!
That’s all for now. Have a great day!
XO, Jorjia