Frustration

a feeling of dissatisfaction, often accompanied by anxiety or depression, resulting from unfulfilled needs or unresolved problems

That’s from dictionary.com, and is the only definition listed that doesn’t refer back to “frustrate”. It’s a great word, and very appropriate definition. It hits the nail on the head. And as you create the Future, a lot of things will frustrate you. Frustration will become part of your life. What do you do about it? What do you do about the dissatisfaction, the unfulfilled needs, and the unresolved problems? The easy answer is to resolve the problems and fill the needs. Thus, frustration resolved. But that’s not always easy. It’s frequently simple, but not always easy.

You have a friend who’s making a mess of his life, and you want to help him, you want his life to be better, but he refuses to take your advice or to do anything to help him. That’s frustrating. The simple thing is to accept your friend and how he is and accept that he’s not going to change until he’s good and ready. Simple, but not easy. It could be that save your sanity, if you truly can’t let go of your desire to help him and your frustration over him, that you’ll have to let go of the friendship entirely. I’m not talking about giving up on him. When he decides to improve his life, be there for him. But first, be there for yourself. You deserve better than to be frustrated over a person every time you see them. If you can’t let go of the frustration, then let go of the source – seeing your friend in such a lousy situation. Giving up on him would mean never being there for him again. But if he’s sincere about his desire for change and his desire for your help, then go back to him. But take care of yourself first.

You hate your job and you need to find a new one. Find a new one. There are hundreds of jobs out there. Check the paper. Check on-line. Simple, and possibly easy. The complications come in with what else your job gives you besides frustration. Money. Those hundreds of jobs out there most likely pay you less than what you’re making now. Plus all the seniority that you’ve built up in your current company would go to waste. Number one thing that seniority gives you? Money. It also gives you security from getting fired when lay offs come around, and perhaps you get a better choice of projects, but since you hate your job, why worry about getting fired? And if the projects are so great, why do you want a new job? It’s a gilded cage – but it’s still a cage. So, what do you do when you don’t have enough money? What do you do when a new job wouldn’t pay you enough to keep up your current lifestyle? You change your lifestyle – simple, but not easy. Do you have credit card debt that you need to make payments on? Pay off the credit cards – stop using them, and pay more than the minimum balance each month. Figure out what you’re getting out of making all those purchases, and get it someway that doesn’t cost you a ton of money. Do you feel the need to go out because you hate your house? Find cheap or free things to do outside the house or improve your house – simple, but not easy. Do you eat out all the time because there’s nothing to cook in the house or there are no clean dishes to cook with? Go grocery shopping and wash the dishes. If you don’t know how to cook decent foods or how to go shopping without having things spoil in your refrigerator before you get around to using them, take a home ec class at your nearest college. It’s simple, but not easy. Change jobs if you hate your job. If you can’t take a pay cut, make being able to take a pay cut your number one priority. Stop worrying about getting a new job or more money and start improving the quality of your life and your checkbook. Put your focus somewhere else for a while. It’s amazing what can happen when you do.

What else is frustrating you? What else is causing frustration in your life? Can you see the simple but not easy solution? Is it easier to live with the frustration than to actually do the work necessary to remove it from your life? Is that what you want your Future to be like – frustrating? You deserve a great Future, but the birth of the Future begins now, in the present. You deserve a great present, but it’s going to take some work on your part to get it. Figure out what is causing your dissatisfaction and fill the need and solve the problem. You are powerful enough to do this. It may be that things will get worse before they get better. Keep your eyes on the Future and what you are birthing. There may be birthing pains, but know that in the end, you will have the Future you deserve.