I was horrified when a friend of mine I hadn’t seen in about 5 years leaned over to steal one of the chips from my plate at lunch recently. I said no, relatively politely-ish, but I know that people often share chips and I wondered why it so annoyed me so much. We’re all triggered by different things and these little incidents often say more about us than we would generally like to admit. And the more we understand them then the better we become at dealing with annoyances.
What Annoys you?
Do you know what gets you angry or irritable? There are some things that most of us find annoying such as the sound of drilling or clipping nails in public. Sometimes hearing someone chewing loudly can also be frustrating. Have you noticed though that you’re more forgiving with some people over others? Also, things change with time so what might have been endearing once upon a time becomes infuriating years later?
Interestingly, there isn’t much research on why certain things annoy us although recent studies show a link between our amygdala, or fight-or-flight control centre, and our auditory region of the brain. Could we therefore have associated sounds or other people’s habits with some form of danger throughout our various experiences of life to date?
With this in mind, we can therefore start putting the question back to us when dealing with annoyances – why does x, y, z annoy you? There are a few different reasons that could be helpful to explore so as to finally remove those annoyances:
1- What’s behind your trigger?
Next time something annoys you, try to connect with the emotions you’re feeling. Anger or disgust might be the obvious ones but now that we know that the amygdala is involved, there’s also some sort of fear or perhaps shame going on deep down. Can you sense which one it is for you?
Be patient with yourself though when dealing with annoyances. You mind find that it takes some time to get used to observing, being honest with yourself and journaling about your feelings so that you can make sense of it all. As an example though, for me ‘stealing my chips’ is about my issues with being controlled, courtesy of a controlling and neurotic mother and narcissist father.
2- Has someone overstepped one of your boundaries?
Emotions such as anger are extremely useful because they’re telling us that something’s wrong. We need to either change something or step away. Often this is when someone has overstepped our boundaries and perhaps borrowed something without asking or invaded our personal space.
As you realise that someone has overstepped one of your boundaries, then ask yourself if your boundaries are healthy and clearly established. If you suffer from codependency, as I have for years, then you might struggle to set boundaries. On the flip side, as a recovering perfectionist, my boundaries are often still too rigid as I expect the world to be perfect. Check out this list of telltale signs that you might be missing out on your boundaries.
3- Are you clashing with different styles of operating?
Let’s not forget that people view the world differently and interpret information in various ways. There’s nothing wrong with this but it can be helpful to understand the differences so that we can tailor our language to something more common. There are so many personality tests out there that try to make sense of this so for example, are you a big picture person or detail-focused? Do you prefer to get to know people and work things out together or are you more interested in process and facts? A simple framework, DISC, can be very helpful as a starting point.
The challenge is to develop awareness and mindfulness so you can learn to accept others’ differences. This is isn’t easy because our minds love telling us that we are right and that our way is the best and only way. Think about all those 7.8 billion minds saying that to each of their bodies? How can 7.8 billion people all be right all the time? They can’t and yet, they can. It’s just an interpretation based on the data we have at that moment in time and the experiences we have as our point of reference that allow us to make sense of it.
4- Your shadow
Last but not least, my favourite part. The Shadow.
Carl Jung, the famous Swiss psychiatrist, introduced the concept of archetypes, or inborn personalities, one of which is the shadow. I’ll continue to explore the shadow in my next blogs because it’s a fascinating aspect of our personal work, should we feel brave enough to do it.
Essentially, the shadow is all those negative traits that our minds are trying to protect us from. We’re basically hiding them away from our consciousness but this means that people who have those traits tend to trigger us by mirroring those traits. Deep down we recognise that we have them too and we are secretly ashamed. The way to get through this is to get to know your shadow. You’ll also start feeling more whole and balanced as you accept this part of yourself. It’s possible to even transform those traits to get the best out of them. Remember that nothing is black and white so for example, arrogance can be seen as confidence, it just depends where on the scale you are.
What’s Next for Dealing with Annoyances?
I always say to take baby steps that feel right for you and that’s the same when dealing with annoyances. Perhaps your first step is to simply observe all those things that annoy you and go from there. You are your best guide and the steps you need will come to you as you start observing. As someone recently said to me though, they were afraid that they would need a whole library of books to note their triggers. But that’s ok. You have to start somewhere and things will become clearer all on their own.
