I was at the Westfield carpark the other day when I saw this guy. đ
Mid-40s.
Nicely dressed.
Shiny European car.
Standing next to what appeared like a flat tire. đ
No big deal, right?
A minor inconvenience that happens to everyone.
But apparently⌠not to him.
Within seconds he loses it.
đ¤Ź
Arms flailing.
Feet stomping.
Shouting words thatâd make even a sailor blush.
And then, as if the situation couldnât get more entertainingâŚ
It does.
He starts kicking the car.
Not the tire.Â
The car.
As if it personally betrayed him or something.
So there I was. Frozen in the car park.
Watching this full-grown man have a toddler-level meltdown.
Yes, I probably should have turned to look awayâŚ
But I couldnât help myself! đ¤Ł
My brain immediately went into diagnosis mode:
| âAh⌠a classic case of nervous-system dysregulation. In the wild. Fascinating.â
Now, Iâm not judging or anything.
I just found it interesting.
I guess weâve all had moments like these. Where the world shrinks to the size of the one tiny thing that isnât working.
But as I stood there watching this unfold,
I couldnât help but thinkâŚ
               | âHow did we get here?â
How did we (the species that split the atom) become so damn fragile that something as small as:
A flat tire
Slow Wi-Fi
Or a misplaced phone
âŚcan send us into full Godzilla mode on an inanimate object?
(Food for thought, right?)
Now, while many people may think complaining, venting, or âblowing off steamâ is a harmless practiceâŚ
Theyâre mistaken.
Every sigh.
Every eye roll.
Every âwhy is this traffic so bad?â
Youâre literally carving grooves in your brain â like dragging a knife through plasticine.
Do it once? No big deal.
But do it every day?
And that groove becomes the Grand Canyon of grumpiness.
And just like water flows down a grooveâŚ
So too do your thoughts.
Not metaphorically.
L I T E R A L L Y
And whatâs worse isâŚÂ
You canât âpositive-thinkâ your way out of these grooves.
That would be like telling someone with a broken leg to, âJust walk it off.â
Uh, no.Â
The boneâs STILL broken.
So the solution isnât as simple as âjust stop complainingâ, {Name}.
It takes serious re-patterningâŚ
Rewiring of the systems beneath the thoughtsâŚ
And repetition to stop yourself from sliding back into old reactive habits.
At least, thatâs what the high performers I coach are doing instead of trying to âpositive thinkâ their way out of decades of bad wiring!
If you want specifics on how theyâre doing itâŚ
Hereâs exactly what theyâre using to reprogram their brains from meltdown moments to default chill mode.
In Love and Wisdom,
Pauline
P.S. I like to imagine the man in Westfield car park eventually calmed down, changed his tire, and drove away. But the neural groove he carved that day? Definitely still there.
