It doesn’t take any skill to let life chip away at us. With each heartbreak, disappointment, or betrayal, it’s understandable how we could become shriveled by life. Yet, despite that, my hope as a wife, stepmother, friend, daughter, therapist, and citizen is to inspire people to become better (not bitter). And that starts with me, or in other words, so I don’t become the kind of person, as a friend once told me, “… whose reason for living is to show us how not to live.”
The seedlings of “better not bitter” blossomed in my awareness years ago, while attending a new friend’s soiree at her opulent penthouse, which I couldn’t help but compare to my shabby chic (emphasis on the shabby) mountain abode.
I felt like a straw-chewing, cut-off-jean-shorts-wearing hick who ambled onto the set of a real housewife show. Perched on a plush setae, I listened to one of the ladies of leisure complain about how “There’s just no good help these days.”
Another whined, “I hate having to buy a new dress for every black-tie gala we attend.”
The one seated next to me slurred, “I’m exhaushted having to juggle the shchedule of our bookkeeper, housekeeper, groundskeeper, chefs, maids, dog-walkers, masseurs, and chauffeurs. I’m deshperate for a shpa day.”
I nodded in mock sympathy, while nibbling on a jumbo prawn, envisioning stashing a handful of them into my purse for a midnight snack.
I’d kill for one of those problems, I mumbled to myself.
Then another voice in my head argued, why can’t you just enjoy yourself? I scolded myself as the women’s glossy lips curled into snarls, bonding over loathing their husbands. One suspected hers of cheating, another said she didn’t care if hers did, another plotted a revenge affair with her pool boy. Despite being in the lap of delicious food, sparkling champagne, and stylish clothing, I couldn’t help fantasizing about bolting out the door.
Days later, grateful to be back in my cozy, rustic home, I stumbled upon a 1study that revealed 50 percent of our happiness comes from genetics, 10 percent is circumstantial (job, relationships, wealth, or health), and 40 percent of our happiness (determined by our habitual thoughts, feelings, and actions) is under our control.
My happiness-o-meter surged as I envisioned that 40% of my own happiness was like turning up the heat on a frosty day.
Years later, still under the influence of that article, I found myself writing about the tool I share in my book A Crisis Is a Terrible Thing to Waste for maximizing our “40%.” My OGLE formula is a deceptively simple yet powerful process that helps us climb out of the mud of victimhood and bitterness toward the mountaintop of self-responsibility and sweet empowerment.
Why OGLE?
In my experience as a certified clinical hypnotherapist for the past twenty years, I’ve reclaimed the word “ogle” from its historic bad-rap definition of “to stare at something in a lecherous manner” and instead “to deeply perceive our circumstances” as in to ogle them through a healing perspective.
Besides, it makes a great acronym and reminds us to examine:
O: What’s the Offending behavior and/or situation? (This is where you have permission to hurl, whine, blame, and judge.)
G: What’s Good about that offending behavior and/or situation? (This is where you become a detective on the hunt for the gift in disguise, even if it seems impossible. For example, look for the intention behind the offending behavior, or consider what happened may be revealing your values on the opposite end of the scale.
L: How am I peering into the Looking Glass? (This is where you wrap yourself in a blanket of compassion while looking in the mirror, asking yourself “Have I ever, or how might I ever… even to the most microscopic degree?”)
E: How will I allow this situation to Elevate me? (This is where you identify the next step to take, toward higher ground, with regards to this issue/situation.)
Here’s how I OGLE’d the women from the aforementioned soiree:
O: What is the Offending behavior and/or situation?
The women’s negativity left me feeling as if I’d been feasted on by emotional vampires. It’s one thing to have nothing and envy people who have everything, but to be bitter and wealthy, bitter and powerful, bitter and beautiful, or just plain ol’ bitter… even plastic surgery can’t make that pretty.
G: What’s Good about that offending behavior and/or situation?
Being around them helped me appreciate my simple life, developing the eyes to see the gold in even the most trying of circumstances—which has become the building blocks for a rich life, from the inside out.
L: How am I peering into the Looking Glass (mirror)?
As I imagine walking in their Miu Miu’s (high heels), I gasp as I realize I also complain about what some might consider high-class-problems: like being overwhelmed by a book deadline, fretting about not enough time in my social calendar for the invitations that come my way, or not having a large enough refrigerator to squeeze in all my fresh groceries.
E: How will I allow this to Elevate me? What Elevated action will I take?
Thanks to the pouty princesses, I see that I can either ogle my complaints or become an ogre who complains about her life. When I catch myself complaining, I remind myself how lucky I am to have the challenges I do.
I also see that despite outer circumstances, all of us are so similar. What differentiates us isn’t what we have or don’t have materially, but our ability to be grateful for what we do have.
In order to not become shriveled by life, we can ogle what offends us, to change the toxic properties of negativity into tonic remedies of gratitude. This requires we do the counter-instinctual move toward, not away, from our pain with wide-open arms, saying, “Thank you, in advance, for making me a better, not bitter version of myself.”
1 https://sonjalyubomirsky.com/wp-content/themes/sonjalyubomirsky/papers/LSS2005.pdf
