I am blessed with lots of natural beauty in my neighborhood. I love to go for walks in the afternoon, sometimes lasting for an hour or more. It's a good way for me to decompress, enjoy the fresh air, and get some thinking done.
However, our neighborhood has a lot of dogs. Most of them spend most of their day outdoors, and practically all of them start barking whenever someone walks past on the street, even at a considerable distance. It's terribly disruptive and annoying. Some of them are quite persistent. On occasion I will walk past as many as five houses at once, all with barking dogs out in the yard somewhere. All it takes is one stupid dog to set off the others. (The small ones are the most aggressive and obnoxious. Sometimes I think that the larger, calmer ones might let me pass in peace if the terrier types didn't incite them to join in raising a ruckus.)
I have tried a number of coping mechanisms, none truly satisfactory, but today I think I finally found one that works.
Anytime I start to think bad thoughts about dogs, I will think good thoughts about cats instead.
Cats, of course, have their own range of annoying qualities, but at the moment I find myself beset by barking bowsers, they don't seem so bad. So I think of soft, fluffy, smart, happy, quiet little kitty-cats, and suddenly the damned dogs don't bother me as much. I know this is no great revelation — replacing a negative thought with a positive one is an age-old tactic for dealing with life's little (and not-so-little) challenges — but I'm far from the most emotionally intelligent person in the world, so it's always a kick when I stumble upon something like this.
(To remind myself that not all dogs are so obnoxious, here is a picture of a cute, quiet puppy with the calmest disposition out of a litter of five in my neighborhood. Their Mommy brought them all to visit us yesterday:)
I am going to try this thought-substitution with all forms of obnoxious behavior to see what happens. When I am trapped in a restaurant or on a plane with screaming kids, I'll think about polite, intelligent adults instead. When I am stuck behind a slow-moving driver (which happens a lot in Hawaii, where practically all the roadways run a single lane in each direction), I'll think about fast bicyclists, or maybe picture myself running along a beautiful beach. How about oppressive forms of authority? I'll think about my tolerant friends instead. I will seek whatever image works to relax me and restore my sense of inner calm.
What this really boils down to, I guess, is the age-old dictum to count your blessings. Even if they're not my blessings, I can still feel grateful to be part of a beautiful world, even if my tiny corner of it feels rather ugly at the moment. Soon the ugliness will pass.
In other words, living well is the best revenge. I'll get it right yet.
Wishing you a beautiful day,
Bill Brent
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