Ok, So I'm a Dweller

I’ll admit it, I’m a Dweller. I re-think, re-play, re-live, analyze, question, talk about, dissect, etc… a situation before I can be done with it. It can be a happy event, or a disturbing event. It can be funny, messy, personal, relative, realistic, uplifting or upsetting. It can even be something that happened to someone else. In whatever way I am affected, I always find something I wish I had done, said, or thought differently; and I dwell on it. Finally, I accept the fact that I cannot change the outcome, no matter how much energy I spend on it, and I begin to move on to a new dwelling event. I do not know what to do about my habit. I am not open to taking medication to control my thoughts. Whatever thoughts I have, they are truly my thoughts and I like that. But I do not like dwelling.

My husband, on the other hand, is a Roller. He is able to experience any situation, react however he happens to react, accept it, and then let it roll. He rarely re-thinks, re-plays, re-lives, analyzes, questions, talks about or dissects a situation more than once (to tell me about it). His stand is “I can’t do anymore about it now, so what’s the point?” He’s right. I want to be a Roller. I’m working on Rolling. But I am still a Dweller.

I am also a “what if”er and “if only”er. I don’t think I’m the only one to play that game. I think (sometimes out loud) to myself “What if I did THIS?”, Or “If only I’d done THAT”. I convince myself that the story would have a different ending, but actually, it would just have a different set of “what if”s and” if only”s to ponder. Why do I do that? I think I know the answer…

I’m an emotional person. I think with my head and with my heart. If my head and my heart are telling me the same thing, I can usually accept the outcome of my actions. It’s when my head tells me one thing and my heart another that I find myself dwelling about my actions.

When what you know, what you think, and what you feel are different, you have options, and options create opportunities; opportunities create choices, and what you choose is your action. What you don’t choose becomes your “what if” and your “if only”. Dwellers focus on the options they didn’t use. We save them, feed them, and let them enter our minds. Rollers focus on the option they did use, and wad up the leftovers and roll them away.

I want to be a Roller…I will learn to roll.

Margaret