Learning to Accept Things As They Are

I HATE making decisions. I drag my feet for as long as possible and when I finally come to a conclusion I replay the choice I made over and over again. I’ve been trying to fix this particular part of my personality for years, but so far I’ve had little to no success.

My husband doesn’t have this problem at all. We are the exact opposite when it comes to making decisions. He thinks about the problem, rationalizes a solution and makes a move. This occurs in a very limited time frame. I on the other hand want to discuss each and every option, write a list of pros and cons, figure out short and long terms costs and ultimately drag the process out for weeks on end.

I believe the problem comes down to two simple facts. First, I second guess all of my decisions. I worry that I will have to live with the decision for the rest of my life and since I’ll never get a re-do I better make the best decision the first time around. In theory I realize this is absolutely ridiculous, but in practice I can’t get that type of logic out of my head.

Second, and simply put, I am too frugal. This is one of the reasons I stuck with an uncomfortable stroller for the first year of my son’s life.

My husband doesn’t suffer from either of these ailments. If he wants to purchase something expensive he takes a few minutes to consider his options and then buys it.

When my husband lost a $200+ pair of sunglasses at a basketball game a few weeks ago we had completely different reactions to the event.  The idea of losing something so expensive sent me into a tailspin. I retraced our steps and searched the house and the car multiple times.

I was angry about the situation. Apparently my husband slipped the glasses into my diaper bag without telling me. While I was digging around for diapers or toys I may have inadvertently knocked them out of the bag. Since I didn’t know they were there in the first place I didn’t check to see if they were still inside the bag before we left.

As an aside I should mention that I have a strange quirk. I do not like carrying my husband’s belongings. Whenever he asks me to hold his diet coke, glasses, camera or any other item that is used solely for his purposes I get a little irked. I know that’s strange, but it is 100% true. Over the years we’ve had quite a few disagreements about holding onto our own belongings. I tend to carry only what I need and before my son was born I rarely carried a purse. I crammed everything, and I mean everything I could, into my pockets just so I wouldn’t be bogged down by an extra bag.

So when my husband’s sunglasses went missing I was angry about the situation. I felt guilty even though it wasn’t really my fault and I didn’t want to pay $200+ for new ones.

When I expressed these thoughts to my husband he gave me a big hug and simply said, “it’s alright.”

To my husband the decision to buy a new pair was an easy one. In the past ten years he’s owned two pairs of expensive sunglasses. (He lost the previous pair sailing.) He wore them every sunny day and sometimes on relatively cloudy days too. He got a lot of wear out of these before we lost them and he will get a lot of wear out of the next pair too.

As he hugged me he pointed out that $200 is a decent amount of money, but it’s also not the end of the world. The glasses were gone and there was nothing we could do to get them back. Crying over the fact that we had lost them was going to do us no good.

This year my new year’s resolution is to accept the things I cannot change. Clearly, as this incident demonstrates, I am failing miserably. I am blessed in so many ways and this tiny little incident really shouldn’t rattle me.

Spending money to replace something lost or stolen isn’t such a big deal. We aren’t strapped for cash and if we were we’d just replace the expensive sunglasses with a cheaper pair.

Okay lesson learned this time around, but I need to do a better job of keeping things in perspective the next time something happens.

4 thoughts on “Learning to Accept Things As They Are”

  1. I have so much in common with you! I also tend to weigh pros/cons when making a decision and am frugal. We recently went skiing in Europe and my husband had to dole out over $200 to purchase ski goggles at the ski resort since he left his perfectly good pair of goggles at home. He was also going to buy new ski gloves (another thing he left at home since he couldn’t find them) but I persuaded him to just use his regular gloves because I couldn’t bear for him to spend another $200 on ski gloves. I was really annoyed because I felt that if he had spent a little more time packing, he would have found/brought his ski accessories and wouldn’t be in this situation where he’d have to pay exorbitant prices to replace them.

    My husband has also lost expensive sunglasses in the past and when it happens, I seem more upset about it than him.

    I, too, dislike carrying my husband’s stuff. Since he never carrys a bag, he sometimes asks if he can place his keys or sunglasses in my bag. I’m fine if it’s small, light stuff, but if it bulks up my bag too much, then I get mad because it defeats the purpose of trying to pack efficiently.

    Reply
    • Your story sounds so familiar. I’m pretty sure my husband and I got into an argument about the very same thing once. It was gloves or goggles or both. I can’t quite remember, but I do know he was all relaxed about the situation and I was livid!

      Also I thought I was the only one with a ‘carrying other people’s stuff’ issue. It’s good to know there are other people like me out there šŸ™‚

      Reply
  2. Oh man, this exactly describes our relationship as well. Throw into the situation the fact that as well as being the frugal and careful one, I also earn more (would be much easier if HE earned more as he’s the one who likes to spend and not watch pennies).

    Reply
    • Interesting point. I always thought my husband feels like he can be careless because he makes more than me. (He’s earned more than me for years and now that I stay at home there is no comparison ;)) I think if he made less I would be even more angry about these types of situations.

      Reply

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