A true tale of an outburst of anger and a lesson in stress management

Today I found out a little more about myself - about how stress affects me and the internal dialogue that transpires....

It was a busy day at work today, without my trusted aides Kek and Ee around. Throughout the day, I had a constant stream of colleagues stopping by at my humble door-less cubicle. Apart from just one guy who actually stopped by for a friendly chat, everyone one else who came or called wanted something to be done.

Now, all this was not without detriment to my own work. I was working on a 3 page checklist for an upcoming online meeting with my overseas counterpart (or rather, boss). What normally took me an hour to finish took me FOUR hours to complete. Nearing the end of the day, I was quite stressed out and unintentionally lambasted another colleague of mine who just happened to cross my path.

At the end of the day, leaving for home (at ~9pm), I thought over the events that had transpired today, how I felt and how I had acted. I realized that I had over-reacted and was wrong in my actions. Along the drive home, I made a silent emotional decision (silent as there was no one in my car to hear it anyway) to apologize to her first thing tomorrow morning when I came to work.

Side issue - halfway home, there was a car that came really close from behind. Tailgating was supposed to be a traffic offense, but unfortunately there was no one around to enforce this law. Almost certainly in the past, I would floor the accelerator and let the fellow eat my dust (or maybe not, since I had no idea what car was behind me). This would have resulted in two cars speeding through the poorly lit streets ahead, a risky affair that would continue until either one of us disengaged (or took opposing paths at a junction or fork). However, my brief by meaningful experiences on the tarmac of the Sepang F1 Circuit and the twisty Batu Gajah track have thought me just how close we can come to losing control when driving in an aggressive manner.

However, as I know now that the streets are not the place for racing, and the road up ahead was dark and under heavy construction, I did something different this time. I maintained my speed and kept close to the road shoulder to let the guy pass. Though, even at moderate speeds, it took him quite a long time to overtake me, so I took my foot off the gas so that he would be forced to swerve into my lane when an oncoming car approached. It was a silver Proton Waja, with a dented bumper and one of those Mugen-style rear spoilers that was as out of place as a Kangaroo in Antartica. Anyway, immediately after the offensive driver was ahead, I noticed that I was now calmer and peaceful. My pulse was beating normally, instead of jumping wildly. Why? It's because I no longer had a mad driver with a risk of collision at my rear end. 10 seconds was all it took to transform this stressful condition. I reflected upon my decision and noted the change in my mind, body and heart.

When I got home, I "upgraded" my earlier decision and gave my friend a call, even before I got out of my car.

An old friend and colleague, I was glad that she understood my predicament and heartily accepted my apology. Over the phone, I managed to get a clearer picture about the issue which cause the enormous ruckus. Practicing crystal clear communication from the start would have avoided my earlier outburst, as I would have understood the situation better and responded differently.

Well, when I hung up, I was happy that we were still friends, and I was lucky to have such an understanding friend who was unfazed by my brazen behavior.

From the episode today, I remember the lessons learned from various mentors, including my GM and the Chief Master Trainer:-

1. Don't take things personally. Nothing people do or say is because of you. No need to get emotionally tangled up in matters. Applies to the seemingly endless stream of colleagues coming to me for help.

2. I have to change before change happens. Doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different results is insane. Do something different and look for the response. By doing something that I have never done when encountering a mad tailgater, I found a better way of dealing with a frequent stressful situation.

3. Make a silent emotional decision to do something, and go ahead and do it! I made up my mind to call my friend. Didn't need to tell anyone about it. Just had to pick up the phone and dial.

4. Crystal clear communication can help to avoid unwanted situations. Don't make assumptions. If I had calmed down and sized up the situation before jumping to conclusions, I would not have acted in this manner to put off my old friend.

Well, the story above is real and unscripted (of course, I have removed references by name, but you may be able to guess if you have a high enough degree of awareness). I just write about it as it happened, and would like to share these lessons that I have learned. Hopefully that has added value to you reading this in some way....