What’s in your cup
Over the last few years, I found that I had a lot of below-the-surface anger in my cup. No one can live life at a higher standard than what we are designed to live at. It causes all kinds of negative emotions and internal conflicts to try and do so. At the slightest jostle, my anger with life in general would come spilling out. It’s crucial that you know what’s in your cup. Even more crucial is that you know the why behind what’s in your cup. It took a long time of rewiring my brain with new thoughts to change what was actually in my cup. But, it did change and it can change for you.
Give this one question some thought before you read on. What’s in your cup today? Think about what spills out of you when things don’t go your way. That’s what is really in your cup. Take that thought one step further. Whatever is in your cup, why is it there? Who or what put it there? The great news is that you can change what’s in your cup anytime you want. Refilling your cup with the best life has to offer all begins with adopting an Attitude of Gratitude.
Allow me to share one simple way adopting an Attitude of Gratitude has changed my life. I currently work in sales at a large dealership group in Wisconsin. Having grown up in Arkansas, Wisconsin is sometimes still a bit much to get accustomed to. It is not unusual at all for it to snow in Spring here.
I was recently out on our lot in the middle of March, dealing with the aftereffects of an overnight snowstorm. As I was cleaning snow off of a car, getting it ready for an appointment, I felt that familiar creep of negativity making its way through the synapses in my brain. For so much of my life, I allowed circumstances to shape my emotions. I bottled up so much rage over my fate in life that the smallest things would set me off. My anger would come boiling out like pasta water in an overheated pot.
As I felt that negative emotion creeping through my brain on that cold spring day, I did something that I’ve been training my brain to do for the last several years. I pumped my mental brakes. In the cold and snow, with a seemingly legitimate reason to complain, I chose to stop and be grateful. I was immediately taken back to my years of working in a factory. That was but one of the many jobs I’ve held as a former bi-vocational pastor. I remembered what it was like to work for several years in a dank, dimly-lit sausage factory. If you’ve ever seen Joe Versus The Volcano starring Tom Hanks, his office experience with the mind-numbing overhead flicker of florescent lights is pretty close to the reality I used to work in.
I took time to stop and not complain about the cold or the snow but to express gratitude for a job that affords me the opportunity of freedom. I expressed gratitude for being able to get outside and see daylight, no matter the time of day or the constraints of work. I was grateful for the great income I earned in sales rather than the meager salary I once took home for the hard work I put in. In fact the very first thing I did was pull out my phone and share my gratitude on TikTok. I made a quick video expressing how grateful I truly was in that moment. I share that story not because it is a big deal. In fact, I share it because it’s small. It’s one small piece, on one insignificant day, in the puzzle that is my life. But, it is a piece that makes sense of all the puzzle pieces around it. It shows me the level of change that has taken place within me — where it really counts. Sometimes, one of the best things you can do to change your thinking is to just take a moment and take a deep breath. When you let it out, you can choose to think in a whole new direction. You are in control of your day. You get to think any thoughts you want to think and have any response you choose to have. Often, we live powerless, stuck in the belief that we have no control over our fate in life, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.
-Jim