My Experiments in the Practice of Everyday Life

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January 3, 2008
15 Comment

Just two days into 2008, I broke several of my most important resolutions.

SunriseSo much for keeping my resolutions.

Last night, on Day #2 of my resolutions for the new year, I broke about fifty resolutions in the space of ten minutes. Possibly a new record.

It was late, and both of our girls, who are usually good sleepers, were up and fussing in their various eight-year-old and two-year-old manners.

The problem: I wanted the Big Man to deal with it, for my own reasons, and he wanted me to deal with it, for his own reasons.

Neither of us was right or wrong. We both had good justifications for why the other person should step up.

But I was ENRAGED. I yelled, I stormed around the room, I said all the things you’re not supposed to say, like “You always…” “You never…” and my personal favorite, “For once, can’t you just…?”

I prevailed — but I lost. I felt terrible.

Many people believe in the “catharsis hypothesis” and think that expressing anger is healthy-minded and relieves their feelings. Not so. Studies show that expressing anger only aggravates it.

I’ve certainly found this to be true; losing my temper just made me angrier. And once my anger passed, I felt guilty about my behavior, which then re-fueled my anger.

I thought again of G. K. Chesterton’s haunting line, “It is easy to be heavy; hard to be light.” I should have expressed myself gently, with a sense of humor. I should have exerted the self-discipline to hold my temper.

Oh, well. As I constantly remind myself as I pursue my Happiness Project, today is another day. I hope that seeing all those reproachful XXXXXs lined up in my resolutions chart will help me remember to do a better job next time.

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On the subject of New Year’s resolutions, or more generally, to-do lists, I just discovered the To Do List blog. It’s like Joe’s Goals meets Post Secret.

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  • Dave Z

    This is leap year – you were provided an extra day, so maybe you can restart your resolutions again. If they were worth resolving, don’t let an arbitrary calender date stop you from beginning anew again.

  • http://travelinoma.blogspot.com/ Travelinoma

    If only life had the desktop buttons, like cut, copy, paste, delete. Then we could make all the corrections necessary without hurting feelings, and experiencing guilt, and looking foolish. Maybe it’s good for us to remember we’re human in spite of everything.
    Whenever I pull out the “You never” card, my husband says meekly, “What about this morning when I…” I think he secretly keeps track of his good deeds just for those moments. I’ve been married 38 years and although I think I’ve learned, my cork still pops once in a while! Luckily we both know those times pass quickly.

  • http://www.blurrypicturesofmycat.com Britt

    I think that much more valuable than the ability to stick perfectly to your resolutions is the ability to get back on the wagon when you fall off.
    Persistent starting is the key. Get up every morning and keep your resolutions again, whether you slipped up yesterday, or you kept them perfectly yesterday—because isn’t it always tempting to say, “But I was good all this week! I can let it slide, just this once…”

  • David

    I can sympathize 100% about braking a resolution. You find yourself thinking, right in the middle of the brake down, “what in the world am I doing…I can’t be doing this!”. The words “I’m sorry” healing a lot of “wounds” and wrongs. And as the Elton John song says “sorry seems to be the hardest word”.

  • Kalieris

    I try not to think about it as breaking a resolution, because then I give up utterly. You’re trying to form a habit of kindness and more gentle speech when frustrated (it sounds like), and I think the concept of “form a habit” is a lot more amenable to picking up and trying again the next day. You’ll get there, because it sounds like it’s really important to you, but you won’t be perfect daily. That’s ok.

  • http://www.43things.com/entries/view/2635979 Loi P

    I think that a good way to release anger is to write about it. That’s kinda like the “catharsis hypothesis” but a bit off.
    I find that if I yell at the other person I feel bad later.
    I don’t think you broke your New Years resolutions you just faltered. I think everyday is a new day.

  • http://pippasporch.blogspot.com Pippa

    Ah, Gretchen, just think: now the pressure is out of the way! Only a couple of days into the year and you don’t have to worry anymore about “when will I stumble?”
    From here on, it is going to be a brilliant year!

  • Joy

    “Studies show that expressing anger only aggravates it. ”
    I think perhaps it’s important to focus on the difference between expressing anger and speaking angrily. I think that it is important NOT to be the cooperative, always reliable, always available partner/parent. I think that it’s unhealthy for people (usually women) who do subjugate themselves completely and always, to the service of others to their own detriment.
    So, in a case like you mentioned, where you and your partner disagree, it is fine and good and reasonable to disagree. I also think you are absolutely right that making sweeping generalisations is really unhelpful in a relationship. Sometimes I try to remember, when I’m arguing with my husband, what our original disagreement was about, and then I ask, “well, what can we do to resolve this? what will make you happy? This (event/behaviour/result) would go a long way to making me feel better.” or “How about we trade, I’ll do this onerous task now, but you take over the grocery shopping for the rest of the year?” or whatever. I think it’s a real opportunity to negotiate.
    Plus, if you broke 50 resolutions, you’re putting too much pressure on yourself, and that’s not going to make you happy. Your blog usually makes me think about the way I handle life and whether what I’m doing makes me happy. This instalment didn’t sound like your normal analytical self. I hope you feel better soon.

  • Chris

    I can SOO relate to this post, and I think you showed a lot of courage by putting it out there. I have two children, ages 9 and 4, and bedtime, especially after routines have been disrupted by the holidays, have been teary and dramatic. My challenge is to not take the anger I have at my husband (over domestic division of labor) out on my children. It’s difficult, to say the least! Thanks for sharing. I personally don’t kick in with my New Year’s “goals” until the second or third week of January. I give myself a little slack to finish up the Christmas cookies before cutting back. Hey, it’s a marathon, not a sprint!!!

  • sylrayj

    You have a great opportunity now.
    I know, that sounds corny, but it’s the only way I get through. If the not-good happened, there’s got to be some sort of silver lining you can use. My thought is that now it’s a good time to apologize, and as I’ve been hearing (from Timothy Goes to School and from the stirring youtube video by the professor with a fatal ailment), there are three steps to an apology. 1. I’m sorry. 2. What I did was wrong. 3. What can I do to make it better?
    What will you do, next time your girls are up too late and fractious, what will you do, next time neither of the adults wants to deal with it? Getting your plans in place makes it easier to bypass some of the stress, and you have the advantage in that you have outlined where things went downhill. A great opportunity awaits!

  • http://www.happiness-project.com Gretchen Rubin

    Thanks for all the encouragement. If I remember correctly, the Shakers would deliberately introduce a mistake into an object they made, to show that man could not aspire to the perfection of God.
    So now I don’t have a perfect resolutions record to worry about! Yep, the pressure is off.
    I think it’s a great suggestion to think about “habits.” As one of my Secrets of Adulthood says: What you do EVERY DAY matters more than what you do ONCE IN A WHILE. To lose it every once in a while is probably ok; to do it every day is going to bring unhappiness.
    As odd as it sounds, I’m trying to do LESS apologizing. I realized that I was using the graceful apology as a crutch — to engage in bad behavior and then apologize, rather than fighting the harder battle not to do the bad behavior at all. But having gone down that road, I did apologize.
    Day 4 of the rest of our lives!

  • CA

    You say “Studies show that expressing anger only aggravates it.” Do you have a reference? I’d like to show it to my husband but he never believes anything unless I have hard evidence.

  • Love Is Always Free

    I personally find that the release of anger is ok, even if it’s towards another person. Sure it agitates more anger, but to me that means that you just have a lot more inside than you realized. The catch is that anger breeds anger only because many times we don’t, or can’t, express it when we should. Subsequently, I find what happens when I do release that anger, is that all of the other memories that didn’t get a chance to express anger in the past now realize the doors have been opened and they try to cram themselves through the opening you’ve created in order to express themselves. This is where my guilt comes from, feeling like I’ve let someone have it for something they did in the past or even worse what someone else did. The point is know when to express it and when not too. It’s your best friend in the sense that it’s very selfish and looks out for your needs every single time. Just know yourself well enough to know when well enough is well enough.

  • http://ottawafoodies.com Mark Warburton

    Benjamin Franklin supposedly said, “Whatever is begun in anger ends in shame.”
    I know, it’s easier to give advice than to follow it but I find this quote to be a useful reminder. I know it has always been true for me. :)

  • http://flyingblogspot.livejournal.com/ Helen

    Gretchen, I second CA’s comment asking after details on the studies that “show that expressing anger only aggravates it”.
    This is really interesting stuff and it would be great if you could refer us to some further reading on the topic!

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