I recently acquired some old ‘patinaed’ (aka a bit rusty), industrial lamp shades which It is now my intention to sell.

However, because they are old, before I can advertise my wares at the market, I need to buy new light bulb holders and flexes to insure they are safe for installation.

So on Friday evening I double clicked myself on the information super highway to peruse for electrical wholesalers near to me who may stock the sort of fittings I am looking for.

There was several boutiques in the area, but only one was willing to trade on a Saturday, but as luck would have it their websites exhibited images of a nature that enticed me into believing that had what I needed.

I jotted their number down on my investigative journalist notepad in preparation for making further enquiries the next day.

The following day as I was just preparing to leave I fought with the inner voice of reason and common sense that says,’ before you go just give them a ring just in case they don’t really have what you want’.

Now, I often attempt the 5 D’s of dodgeball, which are – duck, dodge, dive, dip and dodge, when I pay witness to this  ‘guttural in house utterance’ because it has the traits of a neurotic health and safety officer who holds me back from getting my job done just so they can justify theirs.

However, due to the fact I had to visit the dentists in a few hours and time was therefore of the essence, I weighed up the risks and I succumbed to H&S regulations and called up the shop.

Having prepared the previous evening, I had managed to attain not just one, but two numbers, which initially I thought was good, because the first number failed to hail anyone to assist me in my quest. The second one did however, although the initial hoister of the receiver I realised, after several minutes of explaining my requirements was not the oracle of the shop. Eventually I did get to talk to someone who knew all about light fittings and assured me he had what I needed, but it would be better if I brought the whole light fitting just in case.

So I packed the light, got on my bike and set off.

When I got to there, I introduced myself as the guy who had spoken to them 20 minutes ago, to which I was greeted from behind the counter with blank looks. No such call had been made from me to this store.

‘Must have been our other store in Hampton.’ Was the reply.

And there, in that moment was the First lesson of the day – check what stores the numbers you are calling relate to, or check with the person who answers the phone where they actually are, in location to you!

After we had assessed this must be so, I showed the guy behind the counter my lamp shade and he showed me what they had available.

They had one fitting. And it was brass.

I wanted silver.

It had switches like the ones on a bed site lamps just below the bulb, which I also did not want.

Second lesson of the day – know what colour you want and what you don’t, when it comes to lamp holders etc. Having never had to buy these fitting before, this was only obvious to me after I’d been offered a brass fitting whilst I was holding a silver one! As the old adage goes ‘You don’t know what you don’t know’

Common sense is only common when you’ve see the same thing a lot of times!

The chap at the shop was very helpful and suggested I try another store in Hampton, which he even called up for me to enquire whether they stocked what I needed, which it seemed promising that they did. What they didn’t do however, was open after 1pm on a Saturday and I was going to the dentists at 12pm.

So far this morning wasn’t working out so well.

Everything I’ve mentioned so far seems, after the event – or simply reading this, to have been easily avoidable.

But that’s because after the event we can see ‘the now obvious’ problems and solutions. That’s hindsight for you.

But this morning, what seems like common sense wasn’t common to me and why I wasted my time cycling back and forth from Chessington with nothing to show for my time and effort.

As I left the shop I was understandable annoyed, having just experienced first hand, my mornings previous visionary gut feeling, that I initially dismissed as neurotic, played out in real time.

I shouldn’t have even left the house and I would still have got the same result.

In fact a better result. I could have sat around the house relaxing in the warm for the last hour or so.

However I’ve learnt to be quite stoic in these situations, and once I’ve had my little internal rant, I quickly turn it around by questioning ‘what’s good about this now?’

Not to be a permanently grinning, everything’s great, type of response –  when really that person is having a meltdown, but rather to in terms of finding a way to shift my perspective of the situation.

Because regardless of how I respond, the objective reality of what has happened and the outcome of that, will not change.

Happy or sad, I’m not getting any lamp holders today and I’m certainly not going to turn back time.

But I do have a choice how I emotionally interpret what has and will happen because of it.

I can stay pissed off, cycle home aggressively by winding myself up with self-flagellating self-talk and external blame for stupid shops that do not stock exactly what I want and those that close at 1pm instead of being open 24/7….I mean 1pm on a Saturday what sort of business are they running down there by not catering for my time frames!

……..Or I can accept what has and is happening right now and choose a better way to move into the future.

This is what I chose to see had happened –

1. I’ve got some cardio done and also got out on the bike which I’ve wanted to do for a while, but haven’t done so and would not have done either – certainly not this morning.
2. I learnt a few things today. For starters, I know now, each time I call a store, to check which store I’m actually talking to before traveling to it!
3. I now know a bit more about old light fittings, but more importantly – (because let’s face it, I’m not going to be making a habit of restoring old lamps) – I now know to be more product specific when I am asking for, or looking for a product. Assuming ‘some of the features or descriptions are the same as mine therefore must mean it’s the right thing’ actually does not. Be specific by knowing exactly what you want or need.
4. Lastly, it’s a kinaesthetic thing – a feeling – but I’m reminded when this sort of thing happens, that when I follow this protocol, that instead of staying in an angry and therefore reactive state, this way of enquiry, acts as a sort of release valve, which lets me think more clearly in terms of what to do next.
   At first I thought ‘Bollocks, now it’s going to be another week before I get anything done’ whereas after Id accepted what is and what I had learnt, my new product specific mind thought – ‘now I have a choice and if I want, I can now go online and buy these fittings because I now know what I need. (whereas before I clearly did not) (Personally I would rather see the products, but acceptance and perspective shift gives us ‘a choice’ rather than a feeling of ‘no choice’ and that we are Dooooooomed!

We often have a plan of how we think things will work out and often they do not. That’s life as they say.

How we think or feel about these times makes no difference to those facts. It changes nothing.

However how we interpret those facts and how we use them, does change the subjective way we interpret those facts and how we experience and handle those events.

It doesn’t mean we will feel better than we would have had it all worked out, but it does mean we don’t have to stay feeling as shitty for hours, weeks or years as we may have done in our often normal and human default mode when things go wrong.

Just like the old lamp shades I’ve been talking about selling, some may say are old and battered and should be thrown in the skip, others see them as patinaed, more authentic and currently consequently more valuable.

What might seem like crappy times now may just come to turn out to be patinaed times that could become more valuable to you that had everything turned out without a blemish.