I had the opportunity to observe a friend deal with some potentially sticky social situations recently. There were two fascinating things about their responses –
(1) When the responses weren’t what they wanted to hear, they just moved onto trying something else. No drama.
(2) When I asked this friend if they felt hurt or annoyed by the unpleasantness, they shrugged. The secret to their temperament was not taking it personally. They just focused on what they wanted out of the situation and ignored everything else.
There’s a simple idea I shared recently from Mark Manson’s book that I’ve been thinking about a lot recently – We all walk around giving too many f*cks. We let far too many things bother us – none of this is going to matter when we look back years from now. Leading a good life is about learning to give a f*ck about the few things that matter.
This friend’s temperament and behavior was a great illustration of this idea.
I found it inspiring.
