Even though I am usually very calm, there are times when I lose my cool. Below is one of those times and what I did to ease the stress and calm down so I was able to move forward with my day. Since we moved, one of the challenges we have had is to find the right phone and internet company. We recently changed companies and it has been a huge challenge.

I have been having issues with my home phone. I was waiting all morning on a Friday for the service man to come to fix it. My husband had received a text confirming the appointment and then one stating they would be here by 12:30. At 12:25 I got a call from the repair person who had just spoken with Rick - side note, they were not supposed to be using Rick's number - I made that abundantly clear. Rick told him to call me. The repairman said he just got the repair and would be here in 20 minutes. I blew. I told him to cancel the service call and to have his manager call me. No call. I was so pissed. I finally had a day that I was going to be sewing and it got taken away from me. My blood pressure was off the charts and I was livid.

I had errands to run and things to do to get us ready for our camping trip. So that I was able to get everything accomplished and to calm down, while driving to my errands I said out loud all the things I am grateful for. As I did this, I could feel my blood pressure dropping and I was able to focus. Instead of taking my anger out on everyone I saw, I chose to be nice and smiled at everyone I saw in the bank, grocery store and library and wished them a great weekend.

Once I got the errands done, I then had 1.5 hours of time before we were heading out in the camper. Since I was calmed down, I decided to take the time to sew and I got a lot accomplished.

If I had not calmed myself down, no sewing would have been done that day and I may have allowed the whole thing to ruin the weekend.

Instead, I set it aside and early Monday morning, called and got everything rescheduled. The repairman came that afternoon. I am happy to say the phones are now working.

During times of transitions, there are many challenges. When things don't go your way (and cause stress) do you allow it to totally ruin your day or do you find ways to calm down so that you are able to move forward? How do you calm down?

I would love to hear your thoughts and insights.

I would appreciate if you would take time to email me at gs@connecttocalm.com, call me at 513-907-1733 or post a comment on facebook.