Focus on Things You Can Control

I was feeling frustrated the other day, because I lost in the fantasy football playoffs. This might seem a bit weird to non-sports fans out there, but I love fantasy football. I’m really competitive, and as an adult, I don’t get too many outlets to be competitive other than CrossFit and the occasional game of Scattegories 🙂

This year, my team just wasn’t very good. Some of the guys I drafted didn’t perform up to expectations, and other people got injured. I lost a few close games that could have gone either way. It just didn’t work out this year, and when the first round of the playoffs ended, I was done.

Not Much Control

At first, I was grumpy about it. But it didn’t take me too long to realize that getting frustrated about fantasy football was a bit silly. The reality is I don’t have a lot of control over fantasy football. Sure, I can try my best to draft players I think will do well, but I don’t have any control over how they actually perform on the field or whether they stay healthy or get injured.

3 Types of Business

In life, it’s usually a bad idea to get too worked up about things that are outside your control. Byron Katie says there are three types of business—my business, other people’s business, and God’s business. (God’s business is everything that isn’t under the direct control of myself or another person—like the path of the hurricane or when I will die.)

Stay in Your Own Business

We tend to do better in life when we stay focused on our own business. It’s easy to get drawn into other people’s business, or worry a lot about God’s business. But since we have little control over these areas of life, we don’t really have anything productive we can do with our anxiety. We can’t do anything to fix the problem or change the situation, so we tend to just wallow in our worry.

If you notice yourself getting caught up in other people’s business or God’s business, use that as a cue to refocus on your own business. What can you do that IS under your control? Focus your energy on those activities, and try to let the other stuff go. You can’t do anything about it anyways.