Oh man. I have mixed feelings about these types of prompts; writing about something irritating or annoying can shine a spotlight on that irritation and make me think even more about how irritating it is!
Plus, focusing on irritations makes me focus on things outside of my control, which is not super helpful.
But I’ll give it a go: sometimes I am annoyed by unnecessary helplessness.
I love to help people, so this might seem kind of weird for me to say. But I love to help people when they actually need help.
When someone seems to have no ability to try to figure something out for themselves, or look up the information they need, or give something a try before asking for help, I do sometimes find that to be irritating, particularly if it is a pattern.
And when the person hasn’t put in a good faith effort, then fails at the thing they do, and then places the blame on factors outside themselves, I sometimes also find that to be irritating.
Both of these irritations probably stem from the way I was raised; my parents are big on working hard, taking responsibility, being persevering, and being independent.
So rightly or wrongly, I tend to expect that as the default behavior for myself and for others.
I can’t control what other people do, though, so I figure to minimize this irritation, I can:
- focus on what I expect from myself (I can only control me!)
- not worry about what other people are doing
- decide to not help somebody if it’s clear they don’t really need my help
- give other people grace (maybe they’re not super good at independence, but they’re probably good at some other thing I’m not so good at!)
The marijuana smell that comes from our next door neighbor’s place. Ever since it became legal in Michigan it’s become a far more frequent thing. We like to spend a lot of time on our back deck when it’s nice out, but it’s the place on our property that the smell is most likely to travel to and we find it very annoying.
The erroneous overuse of the word “obsessed.” It is EVERYWHERE online, and it’s not even being used correctly. Obsession is not good. People who are getting really into, say, a chocolate chip cookie recipe, should not use the word “obsessed” to describe their reaction to those cookies.
I am easily annoyed at myself when I do not fold clean clothes and put them back the closets/drawers. So annoying when I do not have clean socks in the sock drawer and have to hunt for matching socks in a pile of clean clothes.
Laziness!!!
I feel you!