Homer Simpson, Kramer, Uncle Cooter, George Jefferson, Khaleesi,  Peter Griffin, Billy Madison:  these guys entertain us.

These are the characters in your life.  Just the name alone is enough to give you a complete visual and feel.  The problem is they are the characters in your FAKE life.  They are on TV and movies, they’re not real.

But fear nothing friends, for you have characters in your real life every bit as amazing, weird, screwed up and exciting as these guys.    They might be a neighbor you can’t stand, the janitor at work with intricate decorations made out of paperclips, the friend that puts on a fake front at parties and facebook and makes her life seem soooo exciting or the cubicle mate that fakes how athletic they are despite being 300+ lbs.

The question I’ll pose to you then, fair and intelligent reader, is Why are your real-life characters annoying and miserable and bring you down but your fake-life characters are entertaining and enriching?

Why do we let our thoughts and feeling about the real people in our lives drive us nuts?

As you’ve by now realized if you have read any of my posts is that I live by a made-up set of rules and regulations called my “PILLARS OF LIFE.”   These are fluid and ever changing but set a basic foundation of the universe to me.  It allows stuff to make sense and adds doses of humor and relieves stress.

The Characters in My Life principal can work for you.  Get ready to have some fun with this.

Do you really think Kramer or heck, any of the characters from Seinfeld, would really be your friends in real life – Hell No!  I wouldn’t want some city guy barging in whenever he wanted with insane plans and no conscious – yet I loved the show for him.    This rule goes for any of the above-mentioned characters and all the others I haven’t included.  They are the cast.   They help make the show entertaining.

Now, step back a second in real life.    Make the people in your life become your cast.  The cast of your show in your universe.    Its incredibly fun and your brain REALLY LOVES THIS!   It just makes sense.

My characters  MAKE the day more interesting and are fun to just sit back and watch.   EVEN if they are trying to bring me or others down.  It’s just good entertainment.

I originally wrote a post awhile back entitled “How the God’s entertain Themselves”   If you want a more in depth look at this, click to it.  Lord knows I could use the clicks and traffic anyway.   No one really read that post – That’s OK mom, this is all part of my experiment with writing phase anyway – But that post was the early Pillar brewing in my mind and has since matured and settled into a fine wine of reality that has truly enhanced my life.

“Oh I can’t stand (insert person of choosing)” has morphed to “haha, I wonder what (same person) will do today.  She be like cra-cra.”      See how that works?  I just went from despising her, to LOVING her!  Now just like any show I have recurring characters that are frequently featured such as my friends and co-workers, I have small bit characters I may see revolve in and out at my kids baseball games and I have characters I’ll never know, they have no names, just the old lady that crashed into my cart at the grocery and yelled at me while shaking her fist in the air because she has nothing better to do in her life.   It doesn’t get me down.  It picks me up!

This may all seem like a small change and may feel even a bit lunatic but it is incredible how much it has changed my stress levels, tension and just bad Karma and bad thoughts as a whole.   The world has enough negative and hate already.  In the past, someone getting mad and aggressive at me would in turn make two of us mad as I’d push back.  Then I’d go home and take it out on my wife or kids as misery seems to be exponential… misery for all!  -Now when one yells at me – I just have a little gleam of entertainment in my eye.  Case closed!

I once had a lady whom I did not know come talk to me at a seminar.  She asked me to sit in a chair and then immediately stuck an acupuncture needle in the top of my head.   She said, “Its good to see you again James.”   I told her, “Hey lady, I’ve never met you before and my name isn’t James, Its Chad.”

She looked confused.  “You’re not James – you’re not suffering from Hemorrhoids?”

Me:   “Nope and Nope, but thanks for Caring.”

There is no reason to despise the characters of your life – good or bad, they enrich the plot and keep you on your feet and stop you from being bored.   Embrace it.

Enjoy YOUR show!