Have you ever heard of Murphy’s Law? What Murphy’s Law basically is that everything bad that can happen will happen. Have you ever had the experience that bad luck is behind your back, just lurking around, getting ready to strike at any given moment? Yeah, it probably sounds that I am exaggerating, but that is exactly how it feels.

Well, if you do have your moments in which everything isn’t going as planned, how do you emotionally cope with it? I am not saying that every situation can be brushed off and keep going. Nor I am implying that you have to eternally mope and blame yourself for the challenge at hand.

In my case, my December hasn’t gone the way I planned. Coming from fall break full of renewed energy, it turned basically into one mishap after another. Long story short, helping some parents at school electronically enroll, I dropped my computer and shattered my computer screen. Totally horrible, right. Just imagine, now I have to save in a fund for the amount of the repair, since I use it on a constant basis.

Later that week, I went online to the local DMV to review my car registration and insurance, and I saw that there were fines on my vehicle that I never received. I was a substantial amount over what I originally budgeted for. Now where am I going to get the money to pay for them? Sigh… a day that I have to go to argue at the DMV.

There was another day in which I got out of school late from enrolling students for the following school year. I had my lunch basically after 2:30 PM, cold, when my lunch schedule is usually at 11 AM. I clocked out, strapped my daughter in her car seat and was on my way to her therapy sessions. Since I was running late, I was just concentrating on arriving to her place on time, when out of the blue, I hit a truck and shattered my passenger side mirror and window. Quite a scare.

Now, this happened all during one week. On one side of the spectrum, I was angry; on the other, shocked and scared. How would I go to an Open House I had planned for the following day? I started to feel bummed, clumsy, a complete klutz. Why are all these things happening to me? Why now?

Now mind you, I was cashing my starter emergency fund to transfer to a credit union. MURPHY’S LAW. EVERYTHING THAT CAN GO WRONG, WILL GO WRONG. There goes my starter emergency fund. I started to get frustrated.

Ok, now what to do when these feelings start to overwhelm you? What did I do? Well, I started to give these events some thought.

Let’s begin with the computer screen. The screen is shattered, but the computer still works. I can still use the touch screen on occasions, and I can save to fix it at a later time. I didn’t lose everything on the hard drive. So, I still have my computer to blog and use it for my teaching.

Continuing with the shattered window. It was a terrible scare for me, and for my daughter. But other than the minor abrasions on my arms, and my nerves, which I needed to calm down while they subsided, my daughter and I were not seriously injured. The car still works, it wasn’t totaled. I asked my brother-in-law for estimates for repairs. I had the money available for the repair. And for the Open House the following day, I took public transportation to get there, and returned with a fellow mom from my son’s school.

The fine on the vehicle, will wait until after the holiday. I’ll just state my case and hope for the decision to be in my favor. Many have gone through this hassle, so I am not the only one.

You see, many times we magnify the situations that happen in this journey called life. Problems are just as big as you see them to be. For me, rationalizing and thinking about the positive has help me cope with the situation, regardless of the outcome. In my specific case, all of these situations are material things, which can be fixed or replaced. My life and well being, are irreplaceable. And thankfully, regardless of what has happened this week, we are well.

This line of thought did not come overnight. It has taken time with my therapist to help me learn to cope with situations. So if you think your problems are enormous, with no possible solution, try talking to a close friend, a family member or a counselor. Murphy will always call at any given moment, only YOU can decide how his visit can affect you.

Have a wonderful and blessed Sunday!