As a motivational change management speaker, I’m hired to help my audiences see situations in a new light and to offer concrete takeaways that motivate them to make a change. I just went through something that reminded me that stressful situations are scenarios that we have more control over than we think.  The only person who gets to decide how stressed out you are is YOU.

So here’s what happened: my wife and I own a rental house and there were issues going on with both the property itself as well as the people that were renting the house.  The issues felt really big because the renters were a wreck, the problems were expensive, and we didn’t know what to do. I’m embarrassed to admit that the house issue had us in a tail spin for three solid days.  It was all we talked about and the topic consumed us. Every detail seemed critical and we were completely stressed out.