I did the math again. Fifteen minutes to get to the car rental place, five minutes to check out, five minutes to wait for the shuttle, fifteen minutes to get to the airport, five minutes to get through security, two minutes to run to my gate. That was forty-seven minutes to get to a plane that was leaving in forty-five. I’d already given up on the idea of filling up the gas at a reasonable price; I was about to miss my flight to Japan.
It was the first time I saw my friend Neil in five years or so, so I pushed the timeline a little bit. And then I wanted to test out his Tesla, so I pushed it even further. What I hadn’t counted on was that there was much more traffic on the way back than the way there.
I’m the last person in the world to admit defeat and become helpless. I’m tenacious (or stubborn, depending on who you ask), so I am always hustling and trying to make something work up until the buzzer. When there’s anything left to do before giving up, I’ll do it.
But sometimes you just get stuck. There was nothing I could do to get to the airport faster. If the shuttle took ten minutes instead of five, I couldn’t change that. I could talk my way to the front of the line in security, but if I get flagged by the TSA, it’s out of my control.
The last action I could take was to remain calm and composed. It’s the line of last defense– everything else is chaos and pressure, so you do the one remaining action available to you: you accept.
I accepted that I might miss my flight. I accepted that they might not even put me on another one and that I’d miss my trip. I accepted that I might have to burn a bunch of miles or cash to fly to my next destination. And what choice did I have? This was the reality whether I liked it or not.
As a result of that acceptance, I was calm and clear-headed. I wasn’t angry or frustrated. When I pulled up to the car rental place I parked the car and sprinted for the bus stop. A minute later the bus for the neighboring car rental place pulled up, so I sprinted to it instead. I ran once I got to the airport, too. There was no line for security, so I made it through quickly, and I ended up making my flight with time to spare.
There’s a difference between acceptance and resignation. If I had resigned, I wouldn’t have rushed and may have missed my flight. Instead I accepted the possibility that I wouldn’t get the outcome I wanted, but stayed focused on making the rational choices to maximize my outcome.
Acceptance is a very powerful tool. It enables you to confront the truth and to use it to get closer to your goals. We all make our best decisions when we are calm and collected.
So how do you learn acceptance? Take phrases like, “I wish…” or “If I only…” or “It’s not fair…” out of your vocabulary. Force yourself to look at the situation objectively. Accept the situation for what it is and recognize that you’ll be best off if you work within the constraints of real life, not an ideal version that isn’t actually happening.
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Photo is some art from the DeYoung museum in San Francisco. The piece on the left is by one of my favorite artists, John Cederquist.
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