How Implementing ‘5×5’ Rule Will Actually Change Your F*cked Up Life

In your 20s and 30s, you’re going to go through a lot of changes and trials – it’s only natural. You’re growing up, you’re moving out, you’re falling in and out of love and you’re trying to find your place in this messed up place we call “the world.” Inevitably, you’re going to be faced with a lot of challenges that hit you in the face like a brick – they hurt, they’re painful and sometimes you have no idea how to deal with them. Recently, I’ve been going through most of these myself and, I’ve been dealing with them the absolute wrong way. Wrong, in the sense that the way in which I deal with them helps no one – especially myself.

My sister, who is way more experienced in life and chock-full of more wisdom than a fortune cookie, gave me some pretty solid advice after I ran to her apartment in tears over my latest f*ck up. After I had finally relaxed and vented my guts up, she told me about something called the “5×5 rule.”

If it’s not going to matter in 5 years, don’t spend more than 5 minutes upset about it.

Now, it may sound pretty cliché and “typical” for someone to give advice like this, and, it seems like a cheesy quote pulled from Pinterest (because it was), but, this rule is actually pretty damn effective if you apply it in the long run.

1. It will help you find perspective.

If you’re like me, you get emotional at the sight of a problem or argument in your life – with friends, family or relationships. I always get pretty upset in arguments with my boyfriend and my friends, so much so that it clouds my judgment and I act out. I say things I don’t mean, sometimes I do things I shouldn’t. If you think about the situation at hand and ask yourself “will this really matter to me later,” it can give you the perspective you need to chill out and just breathe.

2. There are better ways to handle things.

Instead of screaming or fighting with someone over something that may not be as big of a deal as you think, you can realize that this issue is something that can be easily worked out. Knowing it’s not a make-or-break problem can help you ease into a conversation, rather than having a blow-out fight.

3. Some things don’t deserve your attention.

Petty drama and stupid mishaps don’t require your attention. Know when things are “worth it” and things aren’t. And, if someone repeatedly does the same thing over and over again, know when you should do something about it.

4. You’ll realize the bigger problems much earlier on.

Once you implement the 5×5 rule, you’ll start seeing things a lot clearer – especially your problems. In whatever relationship, whether it’s a friendship or romantic relationship, you’ll know what problems are actually problems. And, when the time comes, you’ll know what needs to be done.

5. You’ll be a much happier person.

Overall, when you learn to manage your reactions to things, you’ll become a happier person. Long gone are the days when little things bothered you all of the time, you felt slighted or upset by other people and you were walking around with an angry cloud over your head. Instead, you’ll see things in the long-run and how the pettiness of today will not matter in 5 years, so why waste the now?

Anxiety Makes Me Feel Like No One Will Ever Truly Understand Me

Anxiety isn’t an uncommon topic. Everyone knows what it means to feel anxious about an exam or worried about a loved one or stressed out because life is busy.

But there are so many things about actually being diagnosed with an anxiety disorder that continues to baffle many and there’s still a pretty big stigma around the condition.

There seems to be this theory that my anxiety looks like yours.

There’s this idea of what anxiety should be and when it should happen, and it all gets tied up inside a box with a neat little bow and put away until disaster strikes.

But anxiety doesn’t limit itself to obvious disaster. It takes every opportunity it can find to creep inside and ruin my day.

Anxiety lives in wet towels on the bathroom floor and messy rooms. Anxiety waits for me in my unmade bed and the pile of laundry that isn’t clean.

It lives in every moment in which control lies just outside my reach and it uninvitedly comes with me wherever I go.

Anxiety lurks in every minor symbol of chaos and turns the mundane into a panicked frenzy. It has this ability to turn every mistake into colossal failure and every simple conversation into complex, over-analyzed humiliation.

It turns jokes into tears and every outing into inconvenience until every breath I take becomes labored. It drains every single ounce of joy from my bones and doesn’t give me a moments notice.

It doesn’t always make sense and it doesn’t always allow me to control it. Anxiety is rude that way.

Some days I can fight it off — some days I anticipate a panic attack and I push it off for as long as possible until I reach the safety of crumbling into a ball under the covers.

But some days anxiety doesn’t care that it isn’t a convenient time for me to have a mental breakdown and I succumb to this thing in my brain that tells me nothing is going to be okay.

Some days anxiety wins. 

Some days I lose to the chemical imbalance inside my own head and I don’t get to control my feelings, even if I know they are irrational. Some days anxiety just beats logic.

Sometimes it doesn’t matter how hard I try, I just can’t relax. I can’t “just calm down” and sometimes I can’t do anything but wait for anxiety to loosen its siphoning grip on me.

After doing the research, speaking to the professionals, and comparing myself to others, one thing seems to ring true.

Every single person experiences anxiety differently.

You don’t have my brain or the same chemical imbalance going on up there. You don’t have my personality, and you’ve never stepped foot in my shoes.

So, you tell me, is your anxiety the same as mine?

For more from RC, visit her writer’s page here.  

The Death Of A Loved One Is Not Something You Get Over

July 28, 2010 is a day that will always be etched into my mind. At first, it was a normal day for me. I had graduated high school 2 months beforehand and was just spending my time with my friends, and with my nieces who at the time were living with me.

I woke up that morning to my niece not feeling good, she was running a fever and we figured she may have had an ear infection again so my sister and her boyfriend took her into the doctors. Sure enough, she had a double ear infection, was sent home with medicine and that was that.

We put her down for a nap, and when after dinner I went to check on her, she was still sleeping, so I took her sister to the park by our house. A half hour later, I got a phone call that changed my life. My niece had stopped breathing. My neighbor from across the street came running to the park and told me to get to her house.

She grabbed my niece and I sprinted as fast as I could to her house, I saw 2 cop cars, a fire truck and an ambulance outside my house. It was the scariest night of my life. After 10 minutes my mom called me to bring my niece home and to take care of her and my youngest niece while they were at the ER. As soon as they left, a detective showed up at my house and asked me all these questions.

My neighbor down the street offered to take the girls for me so they weren’t in the way. At 8:15 that night, I got the call that changed my whole life. I had that gut feeling that she didn’t make it, and heartbreakingly I was correct.

I felt like the worst aunt ever, she was 19 months old, and I hardly bothered to spend time with her. I felt guilty that my friends were more important. I fell to my knees screaming and crying, and my brother’s friends ran up to me holding me. Throughout the night my friends stopped by to see me and see how I was doing.

A month after everything happened, my friend at the time was talking to me about my depression and the grieving I was going through, and she was like “not to be mean, but you need to get over it, she’s not coming back.”

I was dumbfounded by her, how could someone say that? I knew she wasn’t coming back! That was my niece though! My heart was broken even more by that comment. I get that she never lost anyone close to her, but you never say that to someone.

The whole year was a blur, I pushed all my friends away because I was grieving, and felt like they would never understand. As the one year mark approached, my best friend told me how our friend wanted her to tell me that I seriously needed to get over myself and that I needed to get over the death of my niece. She kept saying how I need to accept that my niece is gone and never coming back.

We had a strained relationship ever since then, how could I trust her after what she had said? The worst part is she tried to deny that she ever said it a second time! She had apologized after saying it the first time, and while I forgave her, I was very careful around her.

Losing my niece made me realize a lot about how people can be so horrible. There were rumors going around my neighborhood that she was hit by a car while I was babysitting, but the truth is, she passed in her sleep, and her autopsy came back inconclusive, so we will never know what really happened that day.

I have never felt as heartbroken as that night, but I am so glad she is my guardian angel. As much as I wish she were still alive, she is no longer in pain. I will always be her aunt, and she will always be the little girl who lit up the room with that beautiful smile on her face.

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