You probably have some “deal friends”.
These friendships are transactional.
You may work with your deal friends or do business with them.
They are fun, but if there is no “deal” you wouldn’t be friends.
As Harvard professor, Arthur Brooks, says,
“Real friends are useless.”
So true.
That tickles me.
I plan on going out with some useless friends today.
Maybe I’ll make some more useless friends and have a useless friends party.
That sounds like the foundation of happiness to me.
Want to stop your emotional pain?
Byron Katie put it best…
“There are only three kinds of business in the universe: mine, yours, and God’s.
Whose business is it if an earthquake happens? God’s business.
Whose business is it if your neighbor down the street has an ugly lawn? Your neighbor’s business.
Whose business is it if you are angry at your neighbor down the street because he has an ugly lawn? Your business.
Life is simple—it is internal.
Count, in five minute intervals, how many times you are in someone else’s business mentally. Notice when you give uninvited advice or offer your opinion about something (aloud or silently).
Ask yourself: “Am I in their business? Did they ask me for my advice?” And more importantly, “Can I take the advice I am offering and apply it to my life?”
Katie rocks.
Before I was trained as a coach, I had never heard of koans.
A koan is a Zen Buddhist term for a riddle that has no answer.
They are designed to disrupt our logical path of thinking, so we get out of our own way (or become more enlightened).
The most well-known is probably, “What is the sound of one hand clapping?”
I can almost feel my brain shift out of the well-worn paths it usually follows to try to imagine the unimaginable.
Koans are designed to create new neural pathways in our brains.
So, while not exactly a koan, I like to ask myself a question that is koan inspired:
What if the opposite is true?
For example, my daughter is getting ready to head out on a month-long road trip across America by herself. With a very old car. And a phone that only works intermittently.
In the background my brain is telling me that the world is a dangerous place. And that message is getting louder and crankier as her departure nears.
But what if the opposite is true?
What if the world is a safe place?
What?!?
What if just going on this trip gives her new tools to take care of herself?
I think I can come up with good evidence that the world is a safe place. And if nothing else, questioning it has disrupted my doomsday brain whisper.
Try it out on something that is bothering you. The more ridiculous the opposite seems, the better. That means it’s working.