Oh, The Choices We Make

One of our subscribers wrote to me recently and asked if I could discuss
a certain subject that she was having a problem dealing with. She asked
me the question, what if you like your job and believe that you are
doing exactly what you were meant to do, however, you simply do not get
along with your co-workers? What if going to work wasn’t so bad because
of what you do for a living, but because of the people you work with?

I thought about this question for a while and it brought to mind an
incident that happened in my life.

About eight years ago, I was in a 4-car accident.

My brother and his wife had just moved into a new home and were having a
little celebration party. They lived in Seaside Heights, New Jersey,
right on the beach and approximately an hour and a half drive from my
home in Fords, New Jersey. It was a beautiful summer day and I had a
wonderful time at their party.

But my weekend was just beginning. When I left their house, instead of
going home, I had, in the trunk of my car, an overnight bag. I was
headed for Philadelphia to meet up with a couple of my girlfriends. We
were going out that evening to a party and after the party, we were
crashing at my girlfriend’s house in Philly. Hey, I was young, single
and childless. Most of my weekends were full of partying and hanging
out.

I remember driving down Route 70 with the sunroof open on my newly
serviced car, the music was blasting and I was simply enjoying myself.
The sky was beautiful and the greenery made me feel spiritually
connected somehow.

All of a sudden, out of nowhere, an ambulance appeared and the sirens
snapped me back into reality. The car in front of me hit the
brakes—hard. I hit my breaks, too. About three second later, a car
slammed behind me and plowed right into the rear of my car. My car was
pushed into the car in front of me and that car was pushed into the Jeep
in front of it.

I guess it took us all about four seconds before we realized what had
happened. We all climbed out of the cars in somewhat of a daze. Our
first instinct was to check our cars. Mine was fine. There wasn’t even a
scratch on it. I had a 1989 Chevy Nova at the time—build to last (or is
that Ford?). The sports car in front of me was beat up in the front and
the back, and the woman driver was in hysterics—turns out that the brand
new red sports car was her boyfriend’s, and she was very upset.

The first car in the line of cars was a Jeep, and he survived without a
scratch as well. See, my car pushed the small sports car under the
bumper of the Jeep so the sports car was very much damaged.

A small black car that had caused the collision was driven by an
18-year-old who had just received her driver’s licenses three days
before the accident. The car was slightly damaged, and the driver had a
busted lip. She wasn’t wearing her seat belt. Other than her lip
bleeding, there were no other injuries.

The woman who was driving her boyfriend’s brand new sports car was livid
– AT ME. After the police arrived, she ran to them and told them that I
had banged into her car. She wasn’t aware that there was a fourth car in
the accident, a car BEHIND me that had pushed my vehicle into hers.

It took about 20 minutes before she calmed down enough to take in the
scene and realize there was a fourth car. She had convinced herself, and
also was trying to convince the police officer, that I had not been
paying attention and had slammed into her car.

As I look back on the incident, I believe my surreal feelings BEFORE the
accident, played a big role in my reaction AFTER the accident.

At that point in my life, I wasn’t always the calmest person when
someone came in my face with accusations that were unfounded. As a
matter of fact, under most circumstances, if this were to happen to me,
I would have cursed your @#$ out in spades. But for some reason, I
wasn’t upset. I was calm, cool and collected.

Here I was, just in a car accident, and a woman, who is obviously upset
over the damage that was done to her boyfriend’s car, is blatantly
cursing, screaming and accusing me of something that I didn’t do. Yet, I
was not the least bit upset or angry.

It was at this exact point in my life that I realized we are ALWAYS in
total control of our reactions, our behavior. AT ALL TIMES we can CHOOSE
to react in whatever way we want to react.

This one lesson has helped me with so much in my life. Imagine having a
CHOICE for every single thing that you do. The problem is that most of
us react out of habit, and not by choice. We respond to certain
circumstances the exact same way each and every time. Perhaps we were
taught to react that way, or it could be that we simply have reacted a
certain way for so long, we don’t know any other way to react.

Just stop for a minute and think just how powerful you can be if you
learn to control each and every aspect of your life.

What does this have to do with not liking your co-worker, you ask?

If we are being realistic, there may be lots of times in our life when
we meet someone and for some reason, we make a decision that we simply
DON’T like this person. This person rubs us the wrong way. The question
is—what do YOU do? How do YOU react to this person?

Let’s say the person shows up at your desk. When you look at them, does
the heat start boiling in your stomach right away? Do you allow this
person to ruin your day? Your lunch break? An hour out of your day? A
minute? A second? Do you allow this person to cause anxiety in your life
in any way? Do you give this person power over your life? And if so,
why?

When you allow someone else to influence the way you feel, you are
actually giving that person power over you. How do you do this? Well,
let’s say, for instance, you are working on your job doing something
that you love to do and then you realize that at 11:00 you are having a
meeting and this person is going to be a part of the meeting. Now,
instead of you thinking of what you want and need to accomplish in this
meeting, you find yourself thinking of this co-worker. You find yourself
thinking of ways that you could avoid coming in contact with her. You
start thinking, “I’m going to come a little late so that she is already
there. That way, I can go to the other side of the room. If I get there
first, she might sit too close to me—and a whole lot of other silly,
unnecessary, time wasting thoughts. In essence, you are giving this
person control over your life.

The good news is WE HAVE A CHOICE. We can CHOOSE to allow this person to
rent space in our head, as my husband would say, OR, we can CHOOSE to do
what the Bible suggests, and that is to LOVE this person.

What, Girl, YOU MUST BE OUT OF YOUR MIND!!! There is simply NO way I
could LOVE this She-Devil of a co-worker of mine!

No, I’m not out of my mind. You can choose to love that person because
if you look at the situation a little deeper than simply what is on the
surface, you will realize that God put this person into your life for a
reason. Maybe He put this co-worker into your life to teach you
patience, or compassion, or how to get along with people who seemingly
can’t get along with anyone. And for the simple fact that this person is
in your life to help you make yourself a better person is enough reason
to love that person. You feel me?

I was in that car accident to learn a lesson. And, that lesson was that
I had a choice. I didn’t always have to be the angry, up-in-your-face
female when circumstances that were unforeseen happened. I learned that
I had a choice. There are always choices. You are the one who gets to
choose.

I have applied this lesson in every aspect of my life. I could have
allowed this woman to get me so upset that I jumped in my car and drove
back home, calling my friends and saying that I was not going—in
essence, allowing this incident to control my life so much that I
canceled all of my fun-filled activities to go home, mope and be
depressed for the rest of the weekend. I would have probably ended up
calling everyone that I know to tell them about the situation and relive
it over and over again, each time I told the story to a new ear that was
willing to listen. Or, I could have chosen to punch her in the face and
take the risk of getting arrested by the same police officer she was
trying to convince that I was the cause of the accident. Or, I could
have politely pointed out to her that I was actually hit from the rear
and that my car was pushed into hers. Or, I could have helped everyone
out by making sure everyone was OK. Or, I could have simply filled out
my accident report, jumped back in my car and continued on my way to
Philly to have a great time with my girlfriends. Which, by the way, is
what I did.

All types of people will be placed in your life for all types of
reasons. How we choose to deal and react to these situations is entirely
up to use. If someone has been rubbing you the wrong way for whatever
reason, it’s time that you start taking back your power. It’s time that
you stop relinquishing your power over to the same person who you say
you do not get along with. It’s time to STOP and think to yourself,
“what lesson am I suppose to learn from this person?” Stop seeing this
person as the enemy. Start seeing them as a teacher. Someone God put
into your life with a lesson for you to learn.

ACTION POINT: If there is someone in your life that rubs you the wrong
way, make it a point to STOP and discover the lesson you are suppose to
learn. Also, make it a point to say something nice to this person
sometime this week. Who knows, this person may have been waiting for you
to make the first move and before you know it, they may simply turn into
one of your best friends. Not to get into another long, story, but one
of my closest and dearest friends was once a co-worker who hated me (can
you imagine?). She didn’t like me BEFORE she ever got to know me. It was
my first job out of college, and she didn’t like the fact that the boss
made a big thing out of me before I even started because I had a 4.0
GPA. She didn’t like me because I wore braids in my hair and she didn’t
like me because, in her opinion, I was light-skinned. (OK, this is a
Black Thang, some of you might not understand). But these were really
issues she had with herself. Once she got to know me, we became the best
of friends. We are still close to each other, sixteen years later. But
if I hadn’t made the first move to include her in a conversation I was
having, we might not have ever become friends and years of good times
with her would have never existed. So, make that choice to love your
co-worker as God directs us to love each other. For s/he is an extension
of you, a child of God, and for that alone, deserves to be loved.

Dawn Fields is a motivational speaker, author and coach. She has an amazing way of reaching you with her down-to-earth style and her ability to make the impossible seem possible. Sign up for her FREE weekly newsletter by sending a blank email to mailto:yourlifespurpose-subscribe@topica.com.