Chapter 179

“I shake my head, feeling like I just went on a trip that wasn’t even needed.”

Do you ever feel this way? I do. Often. Really often. In conversations with people this happens most often. They tell me things I wish I never knew. They tell me far too much information. They tell me stuff that has no importance at all to why they are talking to me. These are all unneeded trips. And I find myself actually  shaking my head in the wonder of wasted emotion, drama, energy, time and relationship.

It can be as innocent (and still very irritating) as Earl telling me about how terrible his life as a child was, or as deadly as someone causing an argument between friends pointlessly. The people I enjoy best, and choose to spend the most time with when I have choices, are those who don’t take me on trips that are unnecessary.

And Joe Callaway’s advice from four years ago still rings true in my life, and I practice it every single day, that I don’t have to join every fight I am invited to. I don’t have to enter into every argument that I am invited to. Nor every disagreement. It has worked beautifully. But I do choose to keep my mouth closed much more than before. If you find that you are a person who MUST respond, then you have already join a trip that wasn’t even needed.

The best way to head things/matters off early is to guide the conversations you have. And when you find someone with whom this is an unnecessary action to take, spend more time with them!

The rest of your relationships will require you to ask better questions and steer more directly.