Pressure, pushing down on me ...

When songs come on the radio in the car, they almost always manage to change my mood, if I let them.

Most times, though, I'll be in a certain mood and will want to remain there -- whether it's happy, sad, tired or grumpy -- and I'll search the radio stations until something fits.

This is definitely related to my little problem of over-thinking. (I do it all of the time, on a wide variety of topics, and it's most certainly a result of being a perfectionist and wanting to analyze every possible angle of everything, before coming to the perfect conclusion, decision, whatever.)

So anyway, back to the car. I usually need to find a song complimentary to my frame of mind because I'm always wrapped up in my thoughts, and in these moments, I feel these thoughts are important and must be seen through to some end.

But last night, I didn't let my mood control the music. Or actually, the music snapped me out of my mood -- not a good one -- and I actually started laughing at myself.

I was driving home bleary-eyed from my longest workday of the week, all embroiled in a stressful work-related situation in my mind. And boy was I in it. I was having conversations in there, playing out possible scenarios and how I would react, how others would react, what I would say. It was some juicy stuff!

Then this song came on, and just as I was about to change it, I started laughing.

"Pressure, pushing down on me, pressing down on you ... "

And so it goes.

I immediately realized I was putting myself under pressure, in a made-up scenario in my mind, a scenario that hadn't yet happened and probably wouldn't happen, and therefore certainly didn't deserve this much time.

I do this all of the time. And when I choose to share such a scenario with my at-home sounding board/husband, I get huge flack for it. His favorite reaction to most of my scenarios -- "This doesn't even exist!"

In the car last night I finally had a moment of clarity -- sans the exasperated reaction from my husband -- that I was doing it again. Making up situations in my head, and having physical, emotional reactions to them when they hadn't even really happened.

I took this perfectly placed Queen/David Bowie song last night as a kind gesture from the big guy upstairs, telling me, "Hey, you, snap out of it!"

And I listened! It's amazing what you can hear when you open your ears -- and your mind, and your heart -- and listen for those subtle reminders that everything is really going to be OK.