This world can be quite frustrating at times. In fact, it can be goddamned overwhelming to a point that the word "frustrating" isn't even the right word. How do you encapsulate a feeling into a word…an emotion that resembles internal and spontaneous combustion? It's not anger, it's not sadness, it's just frustration at it's purest form. It would be like using the word "hot" to describe the surface of the sun. It's just inaccurate and not strong enough. The type of frustration that leaves you confused, irritated, both jaw and fists clenched. In that feeling, in that moment, you feel like you could launch a person to the moon and beyond. It's doubtful that you'd find much release from such an action, but it's probably more economically logical than launching multiple rockets with thousands of gallons of combustible fuel. Frustration - the new, clean energy, sending people to outer space since 2022.
There's methods to handling such frustrations and unfortunately, shot-putting someone to Mercury isn't the solution. We're told to meditate, we're told to exercise, to eat clean, to get a good night's sleep, to stretch more, to move more, to drink more water, to sit less, to read more, and so on and so on. Most times these steps, whether it be a combination of them or a sole action, will work. You'll see the frustration as a 3rd party and you won't have to associate with it. Other times, these actions won't work and you'll become even more frustrated. You see, the emotion of frustration is like a soda being put into a paint mixer - anything you do seems to make it worse. The only thing that can alleviate that soda can's pressure is either opening up the top and letting out the carbonated foam or just leaving it alone and giving it time. Or fuck it - shake it up more and throw it off the wall for a neat little soda explosion.
Similar to this soda can, it's easy to start the process. All you need is something tiny to happen, like tipping it over while it's sitting on the counter. It was an accident, no one's fault really, but now the can has some pressure building inside of it. Now you either let it out now to abruptly end the cycle or you just give it some time before you can drink it. You can let it out slowly by just barely cracking it…or all at once and you just clean up the mess afterwards. Although, if it's a soda BOTTLE and someone slipped a mentos in there, well, you're going to have a mess on your hands... and possibly an ocular injury. You can open it now, you can open it later, but either way you're getting soda all over yourself and everyone around you. You're going to have to apologize, get paper towels, you'll have to do some laundry or even buy someone some new clothes. You knew it was going to happen, but you had to put that mentos in there, didn't you? NOW LOOK WHAT YOU'VE DONE!
The frustration will pass, it'll either come out quickly and pass through you, or you're going to hold onto it by keeping the cap on it…and then when it opens you're going to make quite the mess. Prepare the towels.
Take note while you're driving alone in your car. We all, surely, have our own personal reactions while we're sitting in a 2,000 motorized box of steel. When that person's driving too slow, you get cut off, someone drives too close to your rear bumper, or someone's just driving erratically…take notice of how you behave. If you're barking to yourself while driving, you may just have a short fuse. Maybe you have a short fuse that day or maybe it's that week or that month or it's just how you've been acting for far too long? Maybe you're just the most passive driver in the world and now you get nowhere because you're letting everyone jump in front of you, you're stopping when you see a yellow light, and you're driving 10 under the speed limit. Hopefully that's not how you live life.
Now, I want to be clear - I am not currently frustrated and nor have I really been today. But this feeling does creep into my life from time to time and I want to address it. Sure, a little frustration can cause us to act in a proactive manner, to get out of a sticky situation. But a lot of frustration can cause to alienate friends, family, kind strangers, and ourselves. If frustration seeps into my mood, it can disrupt my breathing, cloud my mind, and become cyclical. You know what's REAAALLY frustrating? Being frustrated… and not being able to shake it. I don't think there's enough THC/CBD to alleviate this cycle sometimes. Even meditation is only like opening the cap slowly, making a slow mess, and then having a flat soda. It's not idea, but it's better than an explosion…unless you're into that type of thing, but I guarantee the people around you aren't.
Just like everything in our universe, even frustration needs its' opposite. Without the moments of frustration, we wouldn't be able to enjoy the relative peace that we engage in daily. Without that GRRRRRRRRRR building up inside, we couldn't enjoy a wagging tail. We all want to feel that internal peace more than we feel the frustration and turmoil, at least I hope we do. There's probably some people that are addicted to the antonyms of peace. That's their form of self-sabotage. If there's always drama in your life, it's easy to ignore the dumpster fire happening around you. I'm immediately reminded of the dog wearing a hat, sitting in his kitchen, drinking his coffee… while a fire roars around him.
We live lives that are far different than how our brains are wired to handle them. We're connected to almost every human on the planet at all times. Think about that. At any point you can get a phone call from across the world and speak with someone you've never interacted with. That's far removed from the tribes and villages we evolved with. Who knows, maybe they actually do have chikity-China the Chinese chicken.
So yeah, we're going to become a little frustrated from time to time. If you knock the can over, release that carbonation instantly and deal with it. Don't let it build because it gets worse. Pop the top, clean up the mess, then drink your almost-completely carbonated soda. Or seltzer water. Or beer. Or kombucha.