By Kelly Sullivan Walden
Award-Winning Dream Expert and Author of A Crisis Is a Terrible Thing to Waste
When asked why I wrote A Crisis Is a Terrible Thing to Waste, I say, “It’s the book I wish I had when I was dealing with many of my own crises. I hope it will inspire readers to become better (not bitter) so they can sage while they age.” What I mean to say, but I don’t, is what a snarky friend once told me, “… so we don’t become the kind of people whose entire reason for living is to show us how not to be.”
The seedlings of these thoughts first blossomed in my awareness years ago while attending a friend’s soiree at her opulent penthouse overlooking the dazzling Atlantic Ocean. I couldn’t help but compare her McMansion to my meager, shabby chic (emphasis on the shabby) mountain abode.
I felt like a straw-chewing, cut-off-jean-shorts-wearing hick who accidentally ambled onto the set of one of those real housewife shows with more bling than Liberace’s Museum.
As I shivered on plush setae, I listened to one of the upper-crust ladies of leisure complain about how “There’s just no good help these days,” another spouted, “I hate having to buy a new dress for every damn black-tie gala we attend.” The prim one seated next to me sighed, “I’m exhausted having to juggle the schedule of our bookkeeper, housekeeper, groundskeeper, chefs, maids, dog walkers, yoga instructors, nannies, masseurs, and chauffeurs. I’m desperate for a spa day.”
I nodded my head in mock sympathy while trying to stash a jumbo prawn dipped in horseradish cocktail sauce into my purse for a midnight snack, thinking, “I’d kill for one of their damn problems.”
Why can’t you just enjoy yourself, Kelly? I beseeched myself as the women gossiped with disdain. Glossy lips curled into snarls as they bonded over loathing their husbands; one suspected hers of cheating, another said she didn’t care if he was, and another plotted a revenge affair with her pool boy. Despite being engulfed by delicious food, sparkling champagne, and stylish clothing, I couldn’t help but fantasize about bolting out the door like my hair was on fire.
Days later, grateful to be back in my cozy, thimble-sized rustic home, researching for my book, I stumbled upon a website touting a breakthrough study by Sonja Lyubomirsky, Kennon M. Sheldon, and David Schkade[1]1. They’d surmised that 50 percent of our happiness comes from genetics, while only 10 percent is determined by our circumstances (job, relationship status, wealth, or health). I audibly gasped when I read how 40 percent of our happiness set-point is under our control—determined by our habitual thoughts, feelings, and actions.
Surging with excitement, I suddenly saw how elevating our happiness-o-meter (at least the 40% we have a say over) was like turning up the faucet in the shower, raising the heat on a frosty day. Totally doable! In this wild and wacky world, there’s so much we are powerless over. But there’s plenty we can do about our own internal attitude thermostat, which is why I’m so passionate about sharing tools that can help us maximize what is in our lane to change.
My OGLE formula is the tool I share in A Crisis Is a Terrible Thing to Waste. It’s the best way I’ve discovered thus far to help us climb out of the mud of victimhood and bitterness toward the mountaintop of self-responsibility and empowerment.
Why OGLE?
In my personal and professional experience as a certified clinical hypnotherapist for the past 20 years, one of the best ways to overcome a tragic (or even slightly irritating) circumstance is to truly look at what bothers us through an empowering lens. I’ve reclaimed the word “ogle” from its historically lecherous bad rap into that which is healing and useful. Besides, it makes a great acronym to remind us to examine:
O: What’s the Offending behavior and/or situation? (This is where you have permission to whine, blame, and judge to your achy, breaky heart’s content.)
G: What is Good about that offending behavior and/or situation? (This is where you become a detective on the hunt for the gift horse in disguise, aka, “the pony in the poo.”)
L: How am I peering into the Looking Glass? (This is where you look in the mirror and ask yourself, “Have I ever, or how might I ever do the same offensive behavior?”)
E: How will I allow this situation to Elevate me? (This is where you make a promise to yourself to take a baby step toward higher ground with regard to this issue.)
Here’s an example of how I OGLE’d the women from the soiree, as mentioned above:
O: What is the Offending behavior and/or situation?
The glamor-pusses, soul-sucking negativity felt like a black hole threatening to consume me. It’s one thing to have nothing and envy people who seem to have everything. But to be bitter and wealthy, bitter and powerful, bitter and beautiful and just plain ol’ bitter without awareness and self-responsibility…all the plastic surgery in the world can’t make that pretty.
G: What is Good about that offending behavior and/or situation?
They showed me a way of being I prayed I’d never become. Sometimes, I have to see what I don’t want in order to correct in the opposite direction toward what I do want. What’s good is these women reminded me that wealth, status, power, and prestige don’t guarantee happiness. This clarity fanned the flames of my mission to transform every grimy situation I encounter into gold, creating a rich life from the inside out.
L: How am I peering into the Looking Glass (mirror)?
Ouch—this is like swallowing the bitterest pill. I could see that I was just like them in my indulgence in feeling held hostage by what I deemed toxic energy while no one was holding a diamond-encrusted gun to my head. Maybe they had good reason to be upset. It turns out I can play the victim and martyr, like the best of them—milking my pain in hopes of scoring extra bonding points.
E: How will I allow this situation to Elevate me? What Elevated action will I take?
As a result of that night, I’ve become even more committed to turning my life’s tragic (or even the annoying) circumstances into magic. I thank those pouty princesses for holding up a mirror the size of a Las Vegas billboard, showing me what I don’t want to become. In fact, I wonder if they weren’t angels in disguise, sent to teach me I could either ogler or become an ogre.
It doesn’t take any skill to let life chip away at us. With each heartbreak, disappointment, upset, and betrayal, it’s understandable how we could become increasingly shriveled by life with each passing offense, each day, week, month, and year. But antivenom doesn’t make itself. Technicians create antivenom from the antibodies that bind to snake venom components, enabling our immune defenses to eliminate these toxins.
In other words, with a little effort and willingness to look at our offenses under the microscope of our awareness, we can swirl them around within the laboratory of our minds and change the toxic properties into tonic medicine. This requires we do what is counter-instinctual and move toward, not away from, our pain with wide open arms, saying, “Thank you, in advance, for making me a stronger, deeper, wiser, more compassionate, powerful; a better, not bitter version of myself.”
By Kelly Sullivan Walden
Award-Winning Dream Expert and Author of A Crisis Is a Terrible Thing to Waste
