You’ve probably heard time and time again that it’s not what cards you’re dealt, but how you play them (and if you haven’t heard it, take that little nugget with you).

When dealt with a situation you have the power to choose how you’re going to handle. Do you tend to become the victim and say this happened to me, why me, this is unfair? Do you complain to your co-workers, family, friends, strangers?

Or do you say well, here we are, what next?

For me, I’m constantly aware of the power of owning the present situation and doing my best to move forward. It is not easy and I am not always successful. But as I once heard a yoga teacher say, this is a practice not a perfect. I often find myself of the shoulda woulda coulda one-way train to second guessing and even though I do an okay job of moving forward, that isn’t to say it’s without the mind game that comes with re-play and regret.

Essentially I’ve narrowed approaches to life’s situations down to two types of people. There are those who move forward passively, dragging their feet. This approach usually comes with believing that one had a choice in the past, but does not in the future. Then there are those who take control actively and move forward from a place of empowerment and acceptance.

For the sake of a real-life tie-in and because it’s more fun, I will call these two approaches, iPhone-y elbow and floppy boobs, respectively.

The case of iPhone-y elbow
I have had the pleasure of sitting next to the same fellow express muni rider twice this past week. She has a windbreaker on and usually reaches down to grab her Lillian Vernon-eque magazine, then, after paging through loudly, rustles down to her bag between her wide-spread feet and grabs another Something Digest. I’m hugging my elbows in close, pinning my last recipe, when her Lands End arm presses up against my side. She gives a quick glance my way as if it was elbow hugging my rib-cage that was the main obstacle to her reaching down. It went a little something like this.

This happens a few more times, now adding a side-to-side adjustment and exaggerated sighs and a shaking of the head. I can feel her gaze and then she turns to the scapegoat woman standing next to us, puts up her magazine so I can still see her hitch-hiker thumb pointing at me and says, “iPhone-y elbow! I’ve sat next to her before…”

In somewhat shock and confusion, I continue to glance down, amused by my book. She took a second glance back at me and seemed to give an extra-long stare, perhaps noticing my lack of tech. It was uncomfortable – for me, obviously for her, and definitely for the woman standing who got pulled into the woman’s personal bubble saga.

Her reaction was by no means healthy. She was irritated and decided to let people around her (namely, me) know it in a passive-aggressive way. She got others involved and was the back-seat driver to taking control. She was that friend who’s says she’s totally open and flexible! then complains the whole way about how she didn’t even want to see that movie in the first pace and besides it’s way past her bedtime.

Direct and clear communication about her discomfort would have gone a long way. Or perhaps there was something else going on – a rough morning, perhaps. Just like she gets to play an active role in how she will handle the situation, I also have the opportunity to choose how I will handle it. My instinct was to passively-aggressively push back, hold a strong elbow, pretend not to notice. Instead, I softened my eyes, continued to read and keep to the confines of my individual seat. I could not let her choices affect how I wanted to be and show up the rest of my day and out into the world.

The case of floppy boobs
I just finished a great spin class on a Friday night. The locker room was quiet comparatively and a girl comes rushing into my locker section. She seems cool enough, fine I’ll share.

There’s a lot of eyeing up and down in this gym – to which I just grab a eucalyptus scented towel and head into the steam room. A nice change from the noses in the air, she suddenly exclaims, “I guess forgetting a sports bra is a sign I should just go home” to which I laugh a bit because – well, been there. We bond a bit over all the things you can actually forget without it affecting your workout and how a sports bra resulting in floppy boobs is not one of them.

I’m thiiisss close to literally offering the bra off my back then realize the obvious darkened sweat circle that formed between my anti-floppy boobs (due in part because of bra-smooshing and in other part because, well, my “twins” don’t have flop factor). She begins to change back into her work clothes and resolves to come back tomorrow. We exchange parting pleasantries and then it dawned on me how cool her attitude was.

I think I would have been a bit more on edge if I had booked it to the gym on a Friday night only to have to go home. She rolled with the punches, laughed a little, quickly came up with a solid Plan B and moved on. Can we get a slow clap for floppy boobs?! It was inspiring to witness ease in accepting what simply is and doing the best she could in the present moment.

After all, that’s all we can ever really do, isn’t it? Do the best we can with what we are given in any present moment. For iPhone-y elbow, things looked a little differently. She chose to take the back-seat, to complain, bring others down because in the moment she thought it would make her feel better- and maybe it did. But all I could control was how I then handled me. That’s the thing about being in the back-seat, it loves company. But the more quickly you can put yourself in the driver seat, the better the ride. Take floppy boobs. she could have hopped in the back seat, but instead drove herself right into the rest of her evening.

Keep your elbows and boobs in close, friends. The world will be a better place.