Rough Day at Work? Try My Calendar Trick.

Today is Monday, and Mondays are the worst days in real estate. You might think you CRUSHED the previous week, closed an impossible deal, and made everyone happy, only to find that the client did some thinking over the weekend and changed his mind.

I had a $21 million deal that I had worked on for months, and I finally got an accepted offer on Friday. The negotiations had been brutal, but we ended up with a great deal for everybody and the buyer was super happy. I celebrated all weekend! Then, cut to this morning: The other broker called to say that her client changed his mind and didn’t want to sell, after all.

You know the saying, “Time heals all wounds?” Well, it certainly didn’t feel like time was going to heal anything at that moment. It felt like I wasted months of effort, lost a huge deal, disappointed my client, and everything was ruined. In the past, I’d spend this entire week upset about it. But, because I’ve been in this industry for so long, I’ve learned a little coping trick—I call it my calendar trick—and I want all of you to try it next time something really disappointing happens.

Whether it was a huge mistake at work, or a breakup you never saw coming, there are all kinds of rough situations people go through on a daily basis, and many of you are going through a crappy time right now. I understand how you feel. I know what it’s like to be really, really upset and not feel like yourself. This trick works for those small everyday disappointments, it puts that “Time heals all wounds” phrase into action. It’s a step you take while you’re in pain that helps you see the light at the end of the tunnel—that mythical future point in time when the wound feels healed—or at least far more manageable.

As soon as I got the call this morning, I opened my calendar and set a reminder for one month from today. I wrote, “How do you feel about losing the $21 million deal?” As I typed it, I knew (from experience) that by the time the reminder pops up, I won’t feel upset about it anymore. More likely than not, I’ll have sold the client an even better home by then. In fact, because I’ve done this trick before, I felt relief as soon as I hit Add to Calendar. That’s the calendar trick.

You know how you feel sore after a workout the first time, but the more you do that same workout, the less sore you feel? That’s because you build strength and muscle memory when you do something repeatedly. Mental health is not unlike that—the more you get through hard times and reach the other side of them, the less pain you feel each time something goes wrong. Nothing can hurt as much when you’ve been there before and got through it already, right? That’s how this works; It helps you put hard times in perspective. It helps you build your “time muscle” and trains your brain to feel less “sore” from the hard thing you’re going through… because you know that when that reminder pops up, it’s either going to hurt FAR less than it does right now or not at all. The calendar trick buys you back the time you need to get back out there and correct course. It allows you to be functional instead of miserable.

If you want to be successful in your career, learn to resist the wallowing. Don’t let hard times ruin your NOW and prevent you from taking action. Every day is a day you’ll never get back, so set a reminder to revisit that pain later and buy back this week or month of time instead. Trust the universe, trust yourself, and use this trick to push yourself ahead in the game.