Have you ever thought about why it really bugs you when your partner leaves the lid off the toothpaste? Or why you are obsessed with being on time while your best friend thinks nothing of always turning up late?
Why does one person live perfectly at ease surrounded by piles of clutter while another would consider it an irritating mess? I remember visiting the flat of an ex-boyfriend for the first time and discovering he basically never washed a dish. Ever. His kitchen sink was like a horror movie. And I just couldn’t understand why that didn’t freak him out.
It was clear that we each had a different set of rules.
Our rules are hugely important in helping us to quickly and easily navigate our way through life. They allow us to shape our reactions to the things we experience and to judge whether we are moving towards things that work or moving away from things we want to avoid.
But we don’t usually choose these rules knowingly – most of them we soak up from our parents, our culture or our education. They may be obvious and mundane – like manners, the highway code or the etiquette of queuing. (Seriously, in the UK it’s an art.) Others are more ethical and moral, such as vegetarianism, or our laws against killing and stealing.
Whether we’re aware of them or not, all of these rules share something in common.
They are designed to create some kind of order out of the chaos that is living.
But what about those rules we “accidentally” live by?
For example, how many rules do you have for feeling “loved” by someone? Do they have to say it? Constantly? Or can they just show you? Must they buy you flowers? Cook you dinner? Kiss you in public? Never kiss you in public? Agree with everything you say? Never criticize you?
What about your rules for feeling appreciated in your career? How much money must you be earning before you decide you are successful? Is security an important rule for you, or freedom and flexibility?
We all have rules that we live by, consciously or unconsciously, and they are hugely powerful in shaping the quality of our lives. So shouldn’t you take the time to really explore what your rules are? Perhaps should ask yourself:
Do my rules make it easy for me to feel great? Or do they make it easy for me to feel dreadful?
For example, if you have one rule that says you absolutely must be famous to feel truly recognised but another rule that says you must never be criticized to feel loved, then how are you ever going to get what you really want, which is love and recognition?
Are your rules holding you back? Then change them!
If you want to start feeling more relaxed, at peace and in control, then here are 7 powerful reasons to get down to rewriting your internal rulebook:
- You will feel more courageous. Most of us create hundreds of rules for feeling fear and yet very few for feeling confident and empowered. Why not start redefining what it takes to makes you feel scared? Write down the situations that cause you fear and then really question why it is that you feel that way. Is it insecurity? Embarrassment? Rejection? Now actively choose to dramatically edit this list down. A good way to do this is to ask yourself these two questions every time you imagine doing something that scares you: “What is really the worst that can happen?” and “If the worst does happen, will it still matter tomorrow? In a week’s time? Next year?” We feel fear because we are suddenly not in control of an outcome that will directly affect us. And not being in control, for most people, is terrifying. Why not decide to stop fearing what you can’t control, and start relishing taking on what you can?
- Your relationships will dramatically improve. If you catch yourself nagging or criticizing your partner because they haven’t done the housework, or they dressed the kids in completely uncoordinated clothes, or they never buy you flowers, you really only have two choices. To let it upset you every time they “get it wrong” or accept that their system of rules is different to yours. (Changing someone is not really an option – that is their job!) You might vary the kind of language you use and nag in a positive, more encouraging way, but let’s face it, now you’re just nagging with soul. Why not change the goalposts instead? Choose to love your partner first. Choose a rule that says “I respect and value my partner for all of the things that they do, especially the wonderful stuff that I forget to appreciate because I’m too busy zooming in on all the annoying stuff they always get wrong.” And then, why not start voicing this appreciation instead of criticizing? And just be accountable for the things that are non-negotiable for you – if you need a sink without a dish in sight, then just do it yourself and smile that you get to control how you feel about it.
- You will be calmer and more relaxed with your kids. Back in my child-free days, the sound of kids and babies crying in planes and restaurants used the annoy the hell out of me. I couldn’t have a conversation with a friend without their toddler rampaging around my flat picking up and throwing every visible object they could get their sticky fingers on. “Why don’t you just control your child??!” my inner voice would scream. Two little girls later, and my rulebook has been totally rewritten on this one. Having children demands that you be more flexible, that you filter out more and just accept what can be controlled and what cannot. So narrow down the possibilities for your kids to bug you. If you have an admirable rule that says “I will never get frustrated by my children,” then you’re setting yourself up for some serious conflict! Change the rule and accept a degree of parental madness is totally allowed. Or if your rules are more restrictive, instead of shouting at them every time they touch something fragile or breakable, why not just move it? Accept the chaos and learn to appreciate their energy and curiosity and physicality instead of always trying to rein it in. You are not lowering your standards and you are not raising unmanageable children – but you are increasing your opportunities to feel less stressed and frustrated by allowing more flexibility into your life. Ask yourself constantly – is this rule really necessary? Is that boundary there for your child’s benefit, or for yours?
- You will feel more attractive. How attractive you feel to the opposite sex is never about what they find attractive – how can you know what turns them on? What you assume to be attractive is the sum of your “rules for attractiveness”. So think about how you personally define “attractive”. Is it primarily a physical set of rules? Like your body shape? Your weight? Your hair (or lack of)? The size of your bust? Your height? (I could go on!) Or do you define it internally? And what happens when you finally lose the weight or scrape together enough to pay for that boob job, only to look in the mirror and secretly whisper, “Bugger, I still feel ugly, dammit.” Don’t make the mistake of creating a template for feeling sexy that you could never attain. Bend and break your rules instead, and choose to feel like a sex machine based on a better set of conditions. What can you learn from that “bald but so incredibly funny he’s kind of a sex-pot” kind of guy?
- You will feel less stressed. Have you ever noticed that you tend to feel less stressed when you feel in control over your circumstances? Problems arise when we set up boundaries that attempt to assert control over things we can’t control. So rather than wrestle with the unpredictable, accept the uncertainty and instead assert the control over how you will choose to respond. Rewrite your rules by staying flexible and non-resistant to outcomes that you cannot predict as yet. Choose to adopt the rule of “being in the now” as much as possible.
- You will feel much happier, more often. By rewriting more of the rules that are holding you back, you expand the possibilities for feeling great as opposed to feeling frustrated. So why not start with choosing to value happiness – as a rule – first? It’s a choice limited only by your criteria for feeling happy. So why not decide that from now on it’s going to be insanely easy for you to feel happy. That it doesn’t take much to make you laugh. Then see how this dramatically improves the way you feel.
- You will get more of what you want. Most people want to feel successful, peaceful, wealthy, and free (just to get started). But have you really thought about what it would take for you to actually feel successful? Peaceful? Wealthy? Free? Are your conditions for experiencing these feelings actually possible? Or have you set in place a set of rules so rigid that the chances of ever attaining these perfect conditions are virtually nil? Because you can experience blissful happiness eating one perfectly ripe strawberry. Or you can experience incredible wealth, just by being grateful that you get to live on more than a dollar or two a day.
Take the time to actually “design” your rules instead of assuming that your responses and behaviour are just “the way you are”. It’s not about compromising, or lowering your standards. It IS about giving yourself a more liberating and empowering “rulebook for life”. Why restrict your opportunities for feeling great? How many rules can you rewrite to start playing the game you want to play?
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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Do my rules make it easy for me to feel great?
What a smart question. And one that can completely flip the script too. Which I love!
Rules are great. As long as they work. When they don’t, I totally agree with you… time to rewrite them.
Life’s too short, and too gorgeous, to be stuck with blech rules. And even as I write this, I realize that I have more than a few totally-not-working rules of my own that could use some considerably rewriting.
Thanks for this fabulous post, and the much needed nudge to look at my rules and how they make me feel.
When I think about my life rules, I ask the question Am I for real?
The rules are the things that I do (my behaviours) that support what I believe (my values).
A value is a conscious or unconscious meaningful belief. For many of us we have a sense of what we believe …a gut feeling that tells us right from wrong. We may not be able to see our values but they are very real. We express our values in the work we do, the interests we pursue, the political party we support, the opinions we hold, the relationships we have – or more simply the rules.
My rules are focused on organisation and cleanliness, regular exercise and physical activity during sunlight hours, an optimistic view of life, spending time with family and friends. When I stick to these I feel the benefits that you spoke of (less stress, stronger relationships, more in tune with myself)