Opportunities to Handle It

“Life is 10 percent what happens to you and 90 percent how you handle it.”  – Lou Holtz

Photo courtesy of Microsoft Bing

 

I think a part of my subconscious mind was already tuned in to ESPN football analyst and former National Collegiate Athletic Association football coach Lou Holtz’s philosophy when I detached the filter from the machine. Before that moment, I had never ever tried to clean the filter so soon after the espresso finished dripping through; but that day my mind was on about 20 other things and I wasn’t focusing on what I was doing. In my rush to be efficient so I could tackle my next task (baking), I reached for the filter handle to clean up the machine after I made my latte.

BOOM! POP! Espresso grounds flew everywhere.

Let me just say that before I enrolled at the Hypnosis Motivation Institute—let alone became a certified hypnotherapist—this kind of incident probably would have wound me up more than the caffeine I was drinking. But this time, I was willing and very able to take my mishap in stride. Sure, the mess was inconvenient; but there was a silver lining to the clean-up I had to do. I took HMI founder Dr. John Kappas’s advice to just “turn the situation around” directly to heart. Now that I already had to clean up the espresso grounds, this would be a perfect opportunity to really clean the espresso machine as well.  I had recently noticed that the water was filtering very slowly of late; or, sometimes inconsistent amounts of the beverage would be produced. It was time to figure out what was going on so I could get back to enjoying my latte.

The clean-up was also a great opportunity to do some of the relaxation techniques I recommend and teach to my hypnotherapy clients when they are frustrated. I practiced diaphragmatic breathing—drawing slow, deep breaths through my nose, holding the breath for several seconds and slowly released the air through my mouth. Meanwhile, I focused on completely brushing away the errant grounds and then ran the machine with just clear water to flush out the remnant espresso that got stuck in the machine. To prevent my subconscious mind from drifting into negative self-talk and recrimination about all the time I had to spend cleaning up the mess, I sang along with the holiday songs playing on the radio. I thought about all of the holiday festivities to come in the coming days. I even thanked myself for creating an opportunity to give the machine a mini tune-up that would ultimately brew better espresso.

Before I knew it, I had completely handled the mess as well as my non-reaction to it. The espresso maker was clean and working better than it had in a long time, and I had plenty of time to enjoy my beverage before I started my holiday baking. Win-win.

 

 

 

Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.

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