Ignoring Negativity

Why is this such a hard thing to do sometimes? Negativity of others does nothing but bring you down. There are also times that another person's negativity starts to rub off on you, and you then become a negative person. Bottom line, it sucks!

I have blogged about negativity before, just not on here. A great book that I always try to keep handy is Richard Carlson's "Don't Sweat the Small Stuff at Work". Much of his book talks about things that most of us already know. But it also serves as a reminder that we are not the only one that gets pissed off at coworkers, has a frustrating boss, deals with customers that are irrational, or has to do reports all the time. It's a handy, almost pocket size little book, and I love to keep it on my desk. When I first bought it over 5 years ago, I spent my lunch hour highlighting sections that had a lot of meaning. Carlson says talks about the fact that you have to be honest with yourself that you can't make everyone happy every day...there is always going to be someone, somewhere that is mad at you. I love the story he tells about the coworkers he overheard complaining about a report they had to do. It was due in a couple of hours. Instead of "getting to it" and getting the report done, they complained for over a 1/2 hour! Then they complained because they had such a short time period to "get it all done"...How funny is that?

I guess I just get tired off it. When it affects my day to day things is when it is depressing. Times like these remind me how grateful I am to have an ipod that I can listen to, with earbuds!