The Little Things

Life is all about the little things that we think don’t matter or have no impact on our lives, the little things that make us grow apart from our partners, families, and friends. I’m not sure how many of us are aware that these little things that we don’t pay attention to make a ripple effect on other aspects of our lives.

Years ago, I read a news article about a couple who divorced, and their reason was they kept arguing about how to squeeze the toothpaste. To be honest, at that time, I didn’t believe it because it wasn’t a big enough reason to get a divorce. Looking back now, I understand it better. Most likely, this was one of the little problems which created a ripple effect on their marriage. Their actual problem was a lack of respect for each other.

There should be an easy way to create awareness about what matters to us and to the people we love so that these small things don’t take over our lives and change it forever. Here are several steps I think may help us to use these little things to our benefit.

First, we should know ourselves and communicate about the things we can tolerate or not. For example, when I get upset even for little things, I prefer to talk over it right away. However, my husband prefers to wait to talk about it.

Second, we should talk about the problems we face regardless of how small they seem. If we avoid talking, even these small things add up and create big conflicts. The problem with communication is, most of the time, we don’t openly communicate with each other. For example, one of our good friends never tells us clearly what bothers him when we travel together or get together. We always find ourselves playing a guessing game while trying to understand what he meant each time. I guess, according to him, he is being nice and doesn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings, but for us, it is very frustrating trying to guess what he is trying to say. When we wanted to ask questions, he became arrogant, so sometimes, we even avoid him to save ourselves from his arrogance.

Third, we should not take anything personally. Everyone has a different understanding of the situations based on their upbringings and experiences. So, when we interact with each other, we may interpret things differently and may get defensive. So, to prevent this situation at work and in our personal lives, we need to understand our differences and not overreact when we have different understandings of the same situations. Anais Nin explains it simply, “We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are”.

If we use small things to strengthen our relationship with our loved ones, that is good. However, most of the time, it is the opposite because some of these small things like the way we talk, or our attitude became part of our lives. So, we may not even be aware of our behaviors and how we come across. Our goal should contribute to our happiness by creating awareness of our reactions. Life is all about small things, and we can have a positive ripple effect on our experiences and strengthen our relationships.