Never Ending Problems (Solution for Life)

We recently went through a series of unfortunate events that got us extremely annoyed. By the way, when we say "us," we usually mean some of us from the team or all of us. In this case, it was some of us. But the point is, none of these events, taken individually, was much of a problem. But chain them all together, and it caused a week of chaos.

We figured we'd make a video about it since we know they can be extremely frustrating to deal with. You know the saying: when life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. Well, if you've ever gone through a week of chaos like we just did, you know it's nonsense. In reality, you get stuck with a bunch of lemons, and you don't have anywhere to put them. This can break people.

We've seen it happen when someone goes through a series of minor inconveniences that completely ruins their day and sets them back two weeks. So we figured you guys might find some value in how we personally deal with this kind of [ __ ]. So with that being said, welcome to A Lux.

First of all, let's define what we mean by minor inconvenience. You can lose your bank card—not much of a problem. But you could also lose your card, the bank is closed, you miss a payment because of it, something gets delayed that messes up someone else's schedule, and it keeps on going. Soon, you have a tornado of ripple effects you can't control anymore.

So what do you do? Well, in our opinion, the first thing you need to do is to remove yourself from the problem. Think of it like a mental shift. Instead of being out in the eye of the storm, try to position yourself somewhere inside, like you're looking through a window. This is extremely important because when you're in a shitstorm of problems, you can't think straight. You can't prioritize anything, and you end up making things worse.

So the first step needs to be a disconnect from the entire situation. You're not leaving anywhere; this doesn't mean closing your phone and laptop and going on a two-week vacation. It means taking a step back, a deep breath, and looking at things from an imaginary distance. It's like this is someone else's problem, but you have to fix it. You won't be able to think straight if you're emotionally invested.

This is why telling someone to calm down never works. They're in the midst of the chaos, and you are not. You might see things clearly while that person is totally blinded by the storm. This is the position you need to put yourself in, in relation to the problems you're going through.

Now, distancing yourself from the problem can be pretty hard, and many people struggle with it. So we're going to give you three ways to do it. One, if you're in tune with your emotions, you can visualize yourself taking a step back and looking at things from afar. This is the fastest and most reliable way to do it, but it's also one of the hardest.

The reason is because emotional intelligence is not really a strong suit for a lot of people. That's why we also talk a lot about this in the Alux app, which you should check out at alux.com/app. Now, if you are not in tune with your emotions and you're too overwhelmed to take a step back, this method probably won't work for you.

So for the second one, you should try taking a physical step back. Go for a long-ass walk, take a shower, go for a run—anything like that. Make your body physically busy so your mind gets a chance to reset itself. Now, you might be thinking that going for a walk in the middle of your problems is pretty irresponsible, but here's the thing: walking allows you to get out of your head and focus on the world around you, which can help to reduce stress and anxiety.

Additionally, walking has been shown to improve mood and mental well-being, which can help to improve your ability to think clearly and make good decisions. It can also stimulate creative thinking as it allows your mind to wander and think about different possibilities. This can be beneficial when trying to solve problems or make decisions.

Physical exercise also helps to release hormones that improve mood and focus, something that can help you to approach the decision-making process with a more open and calm mindset. So don't think of it like walking away from your problems; think of it like doing a system reset.

And if you're still struggling to take a step back after this, you've got a third option. Think of the entire problem like a test with low stakes. You'll eventually find yourself in a similar situation, but with a lot higher stakes. You could lose your job or your house or your savings; you name it. That's when not figuring it out will be a critical problem.

So take this series of unfortunate events like a test for the real deal. See how well you can manage your stress. Make it a challenge for you to calm down and clear your mind. This can give you just the right amount of confidence to see things through. Any of these three methods can work; if you can do all of them, even better.

All right, so we've got the first step, which is removing yourself from the problem. The second step is to massively increase your tolerance to delays. One of the most annoying things about this series of events is that it creates a massive delay, and there's nothing you can do about it. Your flight gets canceled, your order is delayed, something gets stuck at customs, something is the wrong size, and so on.

When you get three or four things like this happening one after another, it can set you back for a long-ass time. It's frustrating, and there's nothing you can do. This is the point where you lower your time expectations and learn to be extremely patient because look, one of the enemies of decision-making is being impatient.

When you just can't wait any longer, you start making dumb calls. You tend to force things to happen, which usually only makes matters worse. Your flight gets canceled, and you immediately book the next one, but it's 10 hours later, and you're already at the airport. You book a hotel, but you can't relax because you don't want to miss your next flight.

Every timeline is messed up, and you've now got four more problems to deal with. So it's extremely important to be patient and don't rush things. It's unlikely you're going to manage to fix anything through brute force alone.

Now if you're not a patient person by nature, this will force you to be. So take it in and accept it. Yes, things will get delayed; it is what it is. And this will create a bit of downtime. You've got to wait on something, and you're stuck. You can't progress any longer, but by now, you've removed yourself from the problem and accepted the fact that you need to be patient.

This is where the third step comes in. Now it's time to prioritize and take care of the low-hanging fruit. Now, by low-hanging fruit, we mean the small things that are pretty straightforward to do. You don't have anyone to wait for, and you can do them all on your own.

So leave the problem aside and take care of the small things. You're already stuck; you can't brute force your way out of that. So as of the moment, there's nothing you can do. Let's say that in your series of unfortunate events, you're now stuck for 10 hours at the airport, and there's nothing you can do about it.

Well, since you're already stuck, make use of it. Maybe there are emails you need to send which are not urgent, but there isn't anything else to do, so you might as well do them. Or some product descriptions you need to write for your website, or conversations you need to have to give someone an action plan, or helping someone with their problem.

The point is, when there's nothing you can do in your series of events, try to do lateral problem-solving. Solving other things will give you a sense of progress, even though you're stuck with your problems, and a sense of progress is exactly what you need to keep you going.

Finally, for the last step, we'll share one of our problems which turned into a life lesson. So in our series of unfortunate events, a table got stuck between two walls. Yes, we know nothing world-threatening or anything, but this was like the 14th problem in a series of never-ending [ __ ].

The point is, the table got stuck halfway in, so we were left with two options: either pull the table out and scratch the wall or push the table into its place and scratch the wall. And since the wall was getting scratched either way, we might as well push the table into its place, which is what we did.

Now, this might sound like an unrelated story, but when you extrapolate it to the bigger picture, it relates to something that Winston Churchill once said: "When you are going through hell, keep going." When you're deep into a problem, you might as well see it through, especially since you're halfway in it anyway.

Regardless of if it's a small inconvenience or a world-threatening event, on top of this, there is another life lesson to learn. When all of your choices have some sort of inevitable negative impact, go with the choice that's best for you. You can replace "you" with your family or your business or whatever.

And this is how you deal with a series of unfortunate events—or at least how we deal with them. You take a step back, increase your delay tolerance, prioritize, and keep going until it's done. It's a tedious and annoying process, but it builds up your level of stress management so that when you have to deal with truly critical problems, you at least have some experience.

We hope you found this video valuable, Alux! Please let us know in the comments how you personally deal with these kinds of experiences. We're so curious to know. Thanks for watching, and we'll see you back here again tomorrow.

Foreign [Music]