David Foster Wallace made a commencement speech in 2005 to the graduating class at Kenyon College. The Wall Street Journal published it here.
The advice he gave to the students (and the rest of us) is, "stay conscious and alive, day in and day out." As he noted, you get to decide how you view the world around you. You can choose to get frustrated and angry at the slow cashier at the grocery, at the guy who cuts you off on your drive to work, at the parent who can't control her kid...but that's just reacting on auto pilot, it's easy to do. Harder to do is to have empathy...to recognize that the cashier is tired and has been on her feet all day, that the driver might be taking his spouse to the hospital, that the parent might be overwhelmed and in danger of losing her job or house.
You get to decide how to react and your reaction affects your own stress level...
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