"Baby, It's Cold Outside... and Inside, Too!"
It was a Sunday morning and I awoke to my cat Meisha curled up at my side. She rarely sleeps with me except when it’s cold, so I knew without even looking at a thermometer that it must be chilly outside. I heard some nondescript banging that was nearby but I couldn’t make out what it was. I noticed that it was a bit overcast outside so I crawled out of bed to turn on the light and investigate.
“Wow, it is chilly today!” I thought as I flipped the light switch. When the light didn’t come on, I knew what was happening: our power was off. I knew a storm was coming, but there was no precipitation yet. I wondered what event had caused the unexpected power outage.
I live in Austin, Texas and though we don’t have severe winter storms often, when we do, the power goes out more easily than I would expect for the severity of the storms. I grew up in Pennsylvania and spent most of my adult life in northern Virginia. In both states, I experienced fairly significant winter storms that would routinely take out the power for hours and sometimes even for days at a time. Moving to Texas hasn’t yet made me soft on winter storms, so my thought on this day was simply “Oh, well, here we go again.”
After I rubbed the sleep from my eyes, I stepped into the living room and noticed that my boyfriend’s office light was on. “Huh?!?” It took me a second, but I soon realized that the power was not out. Stephen was in the garage flipping breakers. (The noise I heard earlier was him checking the outside breakers.) He had just finished with his diagnostic efforts and told me his assessment: “I think our furnace is broken.”
If you had just experienced this scenario, what would you do next? What would your emotional reaction be? Would you be sad, angry, frustrated, annoyed, scared, or happy?
You may have picked an emotion other than the ones I’ve suggested, but my guess is that most of you didn’t choose “happy.” After all, why would anyone be happy about their furnace breaking — especially when it’s 23 degrees outside?!? Plus, the furnace “decided” to break on a Sunday, which made it an emergency visit, so we knew that we’d have to pay a premium for the visit — and that’s if we could find someone to come fix it at all. There were a lot of reasons to feel “negative” about the situation.
From memories of times I’ve been in similar situtions in the past, I remember how I felt. Here’s are some statements to describe my “default” feelings about a situation like this one :
“Of course the furnace goes out on one of the coldest days of the year!”
“Of course the furnace would break on a Sunday when the rates are higher!”
“I wonder how much this repair is going to cost us. It’s $200 just to have someone come out… and we don’t even know if they can fix it!”
“The companies that repair furnaces are so busy today that it will be hours before someone shows up — if they can come at all today!”
“My entire day is ruined! :( I had planned to accomplish a lot but now all I want to do is figure out how to stay warm.”
Can you relate to the despondency and negativity that I described?
As I’m writing this, I’m sitting in a chilly room as I wait for the repairman to arrive. It’s at least another hour before we enter the time window that the heating and cooling company gave us. At this moment, we don’t know exactly what’s wrong with the furnace or if they can even fix it today. I have no idea how much it will cost, either.
I could be upset. I could be scared. I could feel inconvenienced. I could be angry, bitter, or despondent. But none of those emotions came up for me today. Today I am happy, grateful, and I’m even enjoying this adventure.
But how can that be??? How can I call this an adventure? How can I call this fun?!?
I have to give props to my gratitude practice. My brain has literally been rewired to feel positive emotions more often than in the past. If my experience is any indication, the steps I’ve taken on my Happiness Journey have been incredibly effective. Do you want to know what actually entered my mind today? Here goes:
“Wow, I’m so grateful that only our furnace is out. We still have electricity! I can run a heater or electric blanket to keep warm. We are so fortunate!”
“It’s nice that our furnace went out on a day when we had nothing major planned. Thanks, furnace. You didn’t interrupt our schedule! You are quite a thoughtful furnace!” ;)
“I’m grateful that Stephen has basic diagnostic skills so he could rule out several possible causes of the problem. He’s fairly certain it’s nothing he could fix easily and I’m lucky to have his experience to make that assessment for us before we called a professional.”
“I’m glad that we’re going to get this furnace fixed now, before the big storm comes, possibly tonight or tomorrow. I’m sure the heating and cooling companies are incredibly busy right now but they might be even busier in a few days if this cold weather continues. We are so fortunate to have found someone to come out today to help us.”
“The first company we called was able to come today! And we only had to wait about six hours for them to come!”
“I’m so grateful for the jobs I had that allowed me to put away money for an emergency such as this.”
“My unit has worked almost perfectly since I bought this house in 2017. That’s a lot of days of heating and cooling! I’m so fortunate to have had this unit serve me so well for all of these years.”
“Since it’s a Sunday and I don’t have anything that must be done today, I think I’ll make it a ‘vacation’ day. What would I enjoy doing today? I think it should involve sitting on a chair with a heated blanket.” :)
“Ooh, I’ll bet Meisha will sit in my lap since it’s so cold. I’ll make her a comfy spot on my lap and I can enjoy this moment with her.”
Last, but not least, I realized that my reaction to this “negative” event was quite different than it would have been a decade ago, before I started researching how to be happier. “My observation of my reaction might make a great blog post!” I thought.
And that’s how I ended up sitting in a comfy chair with a heated blanket, my cat in my lap, and feeling grateful for how “lucky” I am today. And, of course, how I decided to tell you about it. :)
My experience reminded me of a quote by Epictetus:
It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.
Could you find joy on a freezing winter day when your furnace suddenly stopped working? Would you experience it as an “adventure” and as an opportunity to adjust your schedule and to take advantage of the moment? Would gratitude be your first reaction when you awoke to a cold house and a broken furnace?
I have to admit that this would not have been my reaction even a few years ago. I used to complain a lot and I used to see unexpected circumstances as challenges to be overcome rather than as moments in which to feel grateful for what is going well. My gratitude practice is the most significant reason that I now see reasons to be happy more often than I used to.
My gratitude practice is also the reason that I find myself in a position of being able to choose what I focus on. Today I could have chosen to focus on being cold, on having to pay for repairs to a furnace, and on being inconvenienced by an unexpected event. Instead I chose to make it a day of solitude, of quiet joy, and of finding immense gratitude for the many blessings in my life.
If you don’t think you can find joy in a broken furnace, trust me… you can. I’m no different from you. I learned how to rewire my brain to experience more joy in life and you can, too. But you have to do the work.
Are you ready to begin?
P.S. Our adventure with the furnace lasted a full week. There were moments of despair — like when we were told that the repair would cost $950 (in addition to the $200 diagnostic fee) and that it would take four weeks to get the part (winter would essentially be over for us here in Austin, Texas in four weeks!) — but Stephen (he’s so resourceful!) found the part for only $150 and installed it himself.
As a bonus during this adventure, I learned that having a positive attitude also helps in arriving at the most optimal decision. Because Stephen and I didn’t panic and didn’t rush into the first option that was presented to us, we came up with several other options. Ultimately, our adventure ended without too much stress or hand wringing.
As a bonus, I learned that being without a furnace during a Texas winter is a minor inconvenience, not a major catastrophe. The story would have been quite different if we were living in Pennsylvania or Virginia (my two past homes)!
Having gratitude is often about being able to see life in a less threatening and more positive way by obtaining a new perspective. A broken furnace definitely gave me a new, happier perspective! ;)