I did a pretty major thing (for me, anyway) about a year ago. I started going to counseling. I don’t know why I call it counseling. One could call it therapy, I suppose, but counseling, to me, sounds more palatable. Which is something else I need to work on, I suppose.
I’m not exactly sure what prompted me to start doing this. I had been sensing that I would get upset/angry over little things and this seemed to be increasing. I’ve also heard wise people say that it makes sense for clergy to go through/be in therapy so I thought I’d give it a shot. I’ll say more about this one day, but it’s been a great experience and it’s been very helpful in dealing with stress and anxiety. It also helps me (somewhat) when I experience little things that drive me crazy.
We’re currently at a resort in Lake Geneva, WI, for a mini-vacation during the kids’ spring break. We checked in yesterday, lugged our luggage up to our room, and the keys wouldn’t work. I’d swipe the card and nothing. I tried a different way. Nothing. I did it fast and I did it slow. I let every member of my family try. Still nothing. I went down to the front desk, they programmed the key cards again and I went up again. Nothing. Now I’m starting to get more than just a little annoyed and I go back down to the front desk. Whenever I deal with customer service representatives, I always hope that they’ll just give me a sincere apology and that will do wonders. Instead this woman tried a bad joke (“You must have a magnetic personality!” to which I gave her the grimmest smile I’ve ever mustered) and then said, “Wow, we haven’t had any other problems with keys today” as if somehow this was my fault. Finally, it worked and now we’re ready to have fun, even if it kills us.
I still didn’t handle this exchange as well as I could have. But I’m pretty sure it could have been much worse if I hadn’t been talking about how I respond in these situations with someone I trust.