Hot and Cold

Today, the heat went out in part of our house. I woke up shivering and discovered that during the night, the temperature outside had dipped to -11 C, and some pipes had frozen, preventing hot water from circulating in the radiators. Of course, this happened on a weekend! Fortunately, our heating system consists of multiple zones, and some of them were still working, so I cranked up the heat and waited. By noon, one area started warming up, but the other stayed stubbornly chilly, as the frozen pipe had not yet thawed. Eight hours later, the final zone started working again, and I finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Fortunately, no harm was done, and the cost was largely non-financial – some stress and wasted time. None of that is important or particularly interesting. What is significant was the degree to which this incident impacted my entire day and the ways I tried to manage myself through it. I can’t deny that I was stressed, mostly because of the timing, as we are entering a very cold time of year and if there really were a problem, it’s nearly impossible to find a plumber who can come quickly. How stressed? It was hard for me to concentrate on work, and I found myself less patient in my interactions with my family. I just wasn’t at my best, and while I knew it and tried to protect others from adverse impacts, was not entirely successful.

The day seemed eerily normal, considering how I felt. I did the things I typically do on a Saturday and even connected with some family and friends, but hanging over it all was this worry, and my insides felt different than my outside appeared. While I’m pleased with how things turned out (no plumber, no flood, and yay - heat in the end), and generally fine with the actions I took to get there, I’m less happy with the way I managed my emotions. I let the tension get to me and didn’t rest easy until the problem was solved.

Life throws curve balls at us, and our challenge is to manage them on both the tangible and emotional levels. For me, focusing on solving the problem helped, while waiting to see if the solution worked was difficult. The longer I waited, the more I spun out worst-case scenarios and contingency plans. Managing my fears of what might be, especially given the uncertainty, was hard, though talking about it with others helped a bit. I had to negotiate with my negative narratives and try to be optimistic that my solutions would work.

What I realized is that walking the talk is hard. I often counsel people to manage their emotions and stay positive, and while I was mostly successful in doing so, I was reminded that none of this is easy when a situation presses our buttons, and we are emotionally compromised. Advice, even good advice, is much easier to give than to follow.