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We have a manual for everyone we meet.

Operating instructions.

The way they should behave – according to us.

Some manuals are more intense than others.

Some are 672 pages long.

We have a lot of opinions. Judgments. Ideas. Rules for behavior.

We think we know what’s best for everyone.

We think we would be so much happier if they would only follow the guidelines we set forth in the manual.

But people are behaving exactly as they need to behave, doing the things they need to do in order to learn and grow.

Even if it doesn’t seem that way to you.

You think you know better.

You want to lay down the law, explain the rules of the game.

Meanwhile, they don’t even know you have a manual for them. They’re clueless.

You can save yourself a lot of grief and worry by accepting people for who they are.

Your friend has been weird lately? Your brother isn’t answering your calls?

You could stew about it. Work yourself up. Call them some names in your head. You could make up a story about their behavior and start to feel aggrieved. Aggravated.

Or you could accept it. They’re just being themselves. Doing what they need to do. For reasons you may never understand.

One of these choices leaves you with a lot more peace than the other.

I learned this concept from Brooke Castillo. Over the years, it’s stuck with me.

I’ve got this neighbor.

He has the BEST yard. It’s immaculate.

Perfectly placed flowers. Sculpted shrubbery. Tasteful Christmas decorations.

He probably mows the lawn twice a week. I think he’s retired. His yard is so beautiful.

I saw him outside today, walking a pair of dogs. From a distance, you can’t tell them apart. Joy on eight legs with two fluffy tails, moving in tandem up the sidewalk.

I’ve spent a lot of time lately thinking about the greater good. (“What outcome here would be the best for everyone? What actions can I take to have the highest possible impact, in my career and in the world?”)

And let me tell you something – when you start using words like best and highest, it can get paralyzing.

You can do a lot of nothing. You can throw your hands up. There’s a variety of possible avenues, and all of them start to seem pointless. Highest outcome? I don’t know. We’re all going to be dead soon, so who cares?

It can get pretty bleak.

But think about my neighbor.

This guy and his yard and his dogs bring me SO MUCH JOY.

It’s easy to see that he loves his yard. Working outside probably brings him a great deal of satisfaction and personal happiness.

Is it possible that doing the things that bring us satisfaction and joy is a form of putting good into the world? Even if it’s something private, like yoga, or art?

Maybe by filling up your own well, you’re able to respond better to others. Maybe doing the things you care about, and doing them well, is a roundabout way of positively impacting the people you encounter. Maybe the things we love bring joy to others, too.

Maybe.

I hope you’re doing the things that bring you joy.

Eckhart Tolle has a concept I really like called psychological time.

Psychological time isn’t fun. That’s when you spend your time asking, “What could I have done differently?”
Psychological time is where you make comparisons. You blame. You dwell. You question your behavior and life choices.
You rehash old conversations endlessly, coming up with the perfect retort to that one irritating guy.
Basically, you’re in your head.

Invest in enough psychological time and you might end up in a thought spiral. Not good!

The alternative is being present. Here, in the now, in your new reality.

Thinking too much about the past creates sadness, anger, and despair.
Thinking too much about the future leads to worry and anxiety.
The future hasn’t happened yet, and the past is over, but you might be dwelling there. Marinating in it like chicken in barbecue sauce.

One day, we will all be dead. But today, we are on earth, having a human experience.
And the human experience is kind of like a playground.
You get to make things, interact with people, and go on adventures.
Cool.

Your job is not to lament what has passed.
Instead, you get to choose what’s next. You get to create your future.

If the past is dead and gone, then what would you like to create next?
What would be fun for you?
What do you want to experience?
What would make you feel the way you want to feel?

This week, try to catch yourself when you’re investing in psychological time, instead of being present.
When you experience worry, fear and anxiety, it’s a good indicator that you’re not present – that you’re somewhere other than here and now.
This week, pay attention.

When I was twenty, I liked a guy who posted really sad lyrics on his Facebook profile.

 

I spent a lot of time wondering about those posts.

 

Another weird song lyric. Who is it about?

 

I was brushing my teeth and thinking about Max’s cryptic Facebook posts. Sitting in class and thinking about his weird song lyrics. I drove some of my friends crazy wondering if the sad lyrics were about me.

 

They weren’t. They were about his ex-girlfriend, and once I figured that out, I spent quite a bit of time wondering why he couldn’t just get over her and be into me.

 

I spent numerous hours pondering these questions. What is up with Max’s Facebook? And later, Why doesn’t he like me? One could say that it was the primary question I asked myself.

 

Here are some of the primary questions the people I know have been asking themselves lately. Here are the topics that are on their minds from the time they get up in the morning until they fall asleep at night:

• Why am I not seeing anyone? It’s been years since my last relationship. What’s wrong with me?
• Why aren’t any of these people as cool as Maggie?
• How will I possibly survive grad school?
• Was getting a divorce a mistake?
• Why haven’t they called me about that job yet?
• Why won’t Kevin date me?
• This situation has gone to hell. What else could possibly go wrong?

So what about you? I want you to consider what you primary question is.

 

What is it that you spend most of your time thinking about, and is that a good use of your time? Does it make you happy, or propel you toward some amazing future? Is it serving you?

 

OR is it just a waste of time? A thought that is perpetuating some bad situation or keeping you stuck in the past, or somewhere you don’t want to be?

 

So. What is your primary question, and is it serving you? Think about that. You don’t even have to change your primary question yet. Just think about whether it’s serving you. Is it what you’d choose to spend your time thinking, if you could think about anything?

 

If not (and for a lot of people, the answer will be no), here are some suggested replacements:

• What’s exciting right now?
• What do I want to create today?
• What could I do to be happier in this moment?
• If this situation were going to turn out perfectly and I didn’t need to worry about it, how would I spend my time instead?

You could even start thinking about how you could make other people happy. What you could do to surprise and delight them, instead of wasting your time dwelling on problems that may not be able to be helped.

People talk sometimes about being picked last in gym class, but they’re probably exaggerating. Maybe they were picked second or third to last. But me? I was actually picked last, more times than I would like to admit.

And that’s because I was terrible. In fourth grade, we were playing basketball, and I got the ball for the first time ever. I ran down the court, feeling like a star — but the gym teacher blew the whistle, completely ruining my moment. I was pissed until he told me why he blew the whistle — I wasn’t dribbling. Because I didn’t know what dribbling was.

I wanted to play sports, but I completely sucked.

In middle school, I tried out for cheerleading and the flag corps, and I didn’t make it on to either team.

By some miracle, they let me play volleyball and basketball. My mom would drive me to games that were really far away. I spent most of the time on the bench, but that was okay, because I was on the team. But it turns out they let everyone play volleyball and basketball in sixth grade. They start cutting people in seventh grade. I cried about both volleyball and basketball.

So sports and I weren’t really friends. I didn’t interact further with sports until I was about twenty. I stayed on my college campus for the summer and my roommate taught me how to use all the machines at the gym. It was really nice of her.

After that, I’d work out for a month or so, and then I stop working out for three months. It was a pattern, and it was because working out wasn’t fun (although I felt better afterward). The elliptical was pretty boring, even if I was listening to my favorite music.

How I fell in love with Zumba

But I kept hearing about this Zumba thing. My friend who lives in another state was a Zumba instructor, and she was always posting about it on Facebook. I joined my gym in January of 2012, and that’s when I set foot in my first Zumba class. The instructor played all my favorite artists: Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber (yes, I’m a fan), Beyonce. I was hooked immediately. And I had the inkling that one day, I wanted to teach Zumba too.

There was one problem: I sucked.

How I got better

I went to Zumba class every day for three months. None of my friends saw me during that time. I started scheduling my whole social life around Zumba. My boss asked if I was going to leave the company and start teaching Zumba full-time. (No. Zumba doesn’t pay that well. But it was a nice idea.)

Zumba classes last about an hour, and at the beginning, I was sweaty, red-faced, and ready to be done about three songs in. But I kept going to class. Eventually, I wasn’t tired until the fourth song, or the fifth song, and later on, it didn’t seem like such a big deal to dance through the whole class.

Becoming an instructor

I went to instructor training — in hindsight, probably sooner than I should have, but that’s okay, because I was passionate about it. My first class was great because I practiced endlessly. But one day I forgot to stretch between classes and tore my hamstring. It was a three-month recovery that made me red-faced again, just trying to get through class.

After I recovered, I started subbing classes at my gym. If you go to a group exercise class you haven’t been to before, maybe you’re a little scared, because you don’t know what to expect. But I promise you that new instructors are just as scared — it takes practice to lead an effective class, and it’s scary to do something new.

The sub who sucked

Sometimes, when people saw that I was the sub that day, they would walk out of class. It didn’t do much for my confidence. Sometimes I would forget the moves and stand in front of the class and stare at them. This happens to all Zumba instructors, but it happened to me a lot, because I was just subbing – not teaching regularly.

Upping my game

One of the instructors stepped down last year, and they put me on the schedule for real. I had a weekly class, and that was when I knew I had to step it up. I started to do things to entertain myself. I started by adding a lot of songs by my favorite rapper, Drake. I danced to “Hotline Bling,” sang along, and had a great time.

I was having more fun, and my students were having more fun, too. I started practicing more at home, because teaching Zumba was something I liked, instead of something I dreaded. And my classes started to grow.

Sometimes, when I subbed, I would have just two or three people coming to my class. But now, on a big day, I have more than 30, and the studio is full. And I can say that I’ve never been sad that I went to a Zumba class – even if it’s hard to get up off the couch, I always have a good time.

Why I love Zumba

I love that Zumba is inclusive. Unlike cheerleading, the flag squad, volleyball and basketball, we don’t turn anyone away. You come, you have fun with us, you practice, and you get better. I think back to middle school Kristyn, who got picked last at gym class and cut from all the teams, and I feel healed, somehow.

Permission to suck

What can you take away from this? It’s important to give yourself permission to suck. These days, I am giving myself permission to suck at yoga. Trouble balancing during poses? No problem. It’s all good. By allowing yourself to suck and showing up to practice — that’s the only way you’ll get better. It can be the same for anything. Blogging. Recording videos. And not just creative things — relationships, too. Speaking up. Being vulnerable. Saying what you mean.

We are so afraid of being judged. But it’s like I tell people who come to my Zumba class for the first time — everyone was new once, and we all remember what it was like. If you’re not willing to really be terrible at something, then you’ll never improve.

I suspect that there’s a sport for everyone. You just have to keep trying things. Give yourself permission to be new, and permission to suck. And then just show up. Maybe you’ll have an okay time. Maybe you’ll hate it. Or maybe you’ll fall in love.