clichés

one of the biggest pieces of advice i have heard to survive the working world, and the world in general, is "don't sweat the small stuff." often, it is amended with "...and it is all small stuff." i understand this sentiment. it is so easy to get caught up in our petty problems and spend too much time worrying about things that are of little to no importance in the grand scheme of things. in practice, though, i prefer to work the opposite way for two reasons.

if i choose to skip caring about small events, i would miss the bits of humor that make work, and life, entertaining. when the office mail guy sent an email out asking if anyone had seen his missing hammer, i could have deleted it without a second thought. instead, i spent a few minutes day dreaming about which co-worker was most likely to steal the hammer--any why. i could have brushed off one co-worker's interest in the timed deodorizer that is in our bathroom instead of spending a few minutes google-ing the TC 9000. i would have missed that this handy device is called the "microburst" and cost upwards of $100. these are not really important events that, at first glance, would be worth my time. but those bits of irreverence are what add up to an enjoyable day.

secondly, if i choose to skip the small events that annoy me, i miss out on any opportunity to grow as a person. it is easiest to see my own personal growth over long periods of time, but the only way that growth is achieved is through small, seemingly unimportant decisions amassed over a period of time. i have an idea of the person that i would like to be. that person is not just going to arrive in a few years. everyday, i have to choose to be that person. when someone sends me a passive aggressive (or just plain aggressive) email, instead of returning the passive aggression, "don't sweat the small stuff" wisdom tells me to blow it off, send a bland response, and move on. instead, wouldn't it be better to take a moment to recognize what the email sender is doing, and choose an appropriate response based on what the person i would like to be would say?

so when it comes down to it, while it's true that it is all small stuff, it turns out that the small stuff is exactly what i want to sweat.