Three Ways to Turn Your Rants into Regales -

Hello there! If you are new here, you might want to subscribe to the RSS feed for updates on this topic.

Cover of Here's Your Sign

Why Not NOW?

“Someday we’ll look back on this and laugh” is a well-worn quote. Guru Tony Robbins adds, “If this is true, why don’t we learn how to laugh sooner – as in NOW – rather than later?”

Great question, Guru Tony! Indeed, why don’t we learn how to laugh sooner at the things that irk us instead letting ourselves fall into our usual default of getting all bent out of shape? It IS possible to do – and really can be a LOT of fun – once you know how.

The first thing you need to do is make a list of the common, everyday things that typically set you off; that as soon as they happen, you just can’t wait to get together with your best ‘ear’ and rant away. We all have at least one or two areas that cause us to grit our teeth and mumble naughty little cuss words under our breaths.

Secondly, make sure your best ‘ear’ is in on the game. They say, “Misery loves company” and some people may take your rant as an invitation to unload their own dirty laundry. Before you know it, everyone is knee-deep in doggy-doo-doo and feeling worse by the minute. Instead, announce your intention of looking for the silliness – the insanity – of the situation for the express purpose of poking fun at it in the most outrageous ways you can.

Please note that I’m not talking about the handful of Negative Nellies whose only purpose is to piss and moan all day long. Nope, this is for the rest of us folks who are fully alive, enjoying the wide range of experiences life has to offer… including the feces, shall we say. Here’s how to have a good laugh at all the follies and foibles in life while you blow off your steam.

Say the Things You Wish You Could Say

I have zero tolerance for small talk and answering obvious dumb questions. Unfortunately, there are a couple of people in my high-rise condo building who apparently are uncomfortable with silences, yet they don’t have the skill to open an intelligent conversation, even trivial things like the tried and true news, sports and weather.

“Did you just go grocery shopping?”, one woman asked me as I got on the elevator with seven bulging bags of food.

“No, these have been sitting in the trunk of my car for the past six months. Maggie was getting tired of the smell, so I thought I take them up to our balcony to air them out.”

Of course, I didn’t say that directly to this woman.

OF COURSE! I did NOT!

However, Maggie – my best ‘ear’ – and I often share the things we wish we could have said in response to those annoyingly stupid questions. This is an important point to remember. There is a huge difference between laughing directly AT people as opposed to laughing ABOUT them and the ridiculousness of the situation AT A LATER TIME, unless you are into alienating yourself from people.

My brother bought me a book titled, “Here’s Your Sign!” by Bill Engvall. If you don’t have a best ‘ear’ like I’m blessed with, or you need some ideas to stimulate that dormant ‘Snappy Come-back’ button of yours, this will have you rolling on the floor laughing in no time.

If You Can’t Beat Them, Be Them!

One of the things that bothers me the most about my private music teaching work is ‘The Pushy Parent’. It’s bad enough they bring their bumbling Bozos in for me to try to turn into mighty Mozarts. The Pushy Parent wants this impossible feat accomplished… YESTERDAY.

After a long, frustrating day of teaching, I’ll come home and start my rant to Maggie, reliving each painful moment. One day I imitated one of the pushiest of all Pushy Parents I have ever encountered. This guy happened to be Chinese, just like Maggie. At first, I thought she would be offended that I was picking on her race as the ‘Pushy Parent’ is very common among her people.

But I just couldn’t help myself; I didn’t care anymore. Mocking this guy was part of my rant and I needed to blow of some steam, big time. “How he DOING today? When he going to do EXAM? You PUSH him, YES? You push him HAH-DAH!” (harder)

Push Him Hahdah

This particular ‘Pushy Parent’ always talks loud, fast and extremely animated, eyes flaring, arms flailing. With all my pent-up energy, it was easy for me to duplicate this guy.

I launched into my act, imitating as best I could with over-exaggerated voice, eye and arm movements. Maggie laughed hysterically. In fact, she complemented me by saying that I should be doing voice-overs and characterizations; that I had the broken English dialect down pat. Again, you need to have that great ‘ear’ who will let you blow off steam in whatever way you find necessary. Since that time, Maggie and I have shared many other laughs over our cultural differences. Again, we keep these things all to ourselves… OF COURSE!

Write and Share Your Experiences

So far, I’ve talked about having a best ‘ear’ to vent to. There are many times when your ‘source’ of irritation simply won’t see your ‘humorous take’ on the situation. That’s why you keep your laughter and fun-poking between you and your best ‘ear’.

However, there are some common, every day experiences that happen because of you; or that enough time has passed when all parties involved can truly ‘look back and laugh’. These need to be written and shared. Here’s why.

When you’re going through a difficult time, it can often feel like you are the ONLY one to ever have experienced this. Nothing could be further from the truth. During my research for this article, I came across other similar blogs that recounted some personal events that made me gasp, “This happened to them, too?”

For example, raising kids is a HOT opportunity for turning ranting into regaling as the daily challenges bring out the best – and worst – in parents. This morning I read a hilarious post about a mom who locked her teenage son out of the house. “What’s so funny about that?” you may ask. Well, you have to read the ‘why’ and ‘how’ and the eventual resolution to fully appreciate the account.

The comments on that post were even funnier. One woman openly admitted to duct-taping her 11 year old to the kitchen chair in a moment of total exasperation.

What kind of ‘sick’ parent would do that to their kid? Well, what parent hasn’t honestly FELT like doing that at least once during the child-rearing years?

All these stories prove that we are NOT alone. We all have moments that drive us to the brink of insanity and despair. Still, we all have the same choices. We can wallow in self-pity, dragging everyone down with us.

Or we can take a little more optimistic approach and claim, “Some day we’ll look back at this and laugh.” Even better, why not make some day TODAY by: