Turn Stress into Excitement

Can you turn stress into excitement?

I spent some time at my grandparents’ house near St. Raphael, and today, my mom and I drove to Nice. My mom is a teacher. My grandma was a teacher. And my grandfather? Well, he was a teacher too, but in math. Today was my mom’s first day back at school, but also her first day at a new school in Nice.

When we moved back to France from Thailand 14 years ago, I started French school for the first time in my life. I gradually switched from speaking English with my brother and sister to speaking French because it was more practical for our mutual friends to understand us. My brother and sister are only a year and a half younger than I am, so we share many of the same friends. My brother is a pretty private guy. He doesn’t like being in the spotlight. I don’t think I ever got his permission to post his face or anything identifiable on my social media. My sister, on the other hand, is different. She enjoys being on TikTok. She has always been a down-to-earth, easy-going person. She speaks her mind and has a lot of friends. She doesn’t struggle to reach out and maintain long-term friendships. I often look up to her and wonder how she can just be happy and content. She sets goals and works towards them without making a big deal of the effort required—she just does it. Yet, she doesn’t constantly seek more. She is generally satisfied and doesn’t strive to be happier; she simply is where she’s at, and that’s enough for her.

After five years, going from grade 5 (“la classe de CM2”) through to grade 9 in a small village of exactly 3,032 inhabitants in 2015, I sought to apply to good high schools, which inevitably were in more populated areas. That’s how I moved to Grenoble and attended classes at the International School of Grenoble (“Cité Scolaire Internationale (CSI)”), also known as Europole. I stayed with a host family for the first year while my brother and sister finished middle school. They’re one grade below me. My mom had to navigate the whole public school job placement system to hopefully get a teaching job in Grenoble, and my dad also had to find work.

It took a year. After that, my mom stayed in Grenoble for seven years. She even bought three apartments there. She’s not rich—French teachers are notoriously underpaid, according to her. And she’s not wrong. But she’s a master at saving money. She needs a lot of security and stability. She feels anxious when money isn’t coming in, even though, if you ask me, she has more than enough in the bank to live decently for several years. 

A few months ago, she took a leap. She studied the French public school job placement system to figure out how to build points to secure a job where she really wanted to live. She waited about four months for the public system to notify her a month in advance of where she would be moving and working in September. You can imagine the kind of stress she’s been under. In one month, she put her Grenoble apartment up for sale. She dealt with the leases for her two other apartments, as she rents them out to students who move out each year around this time. Last week, she finally learned what class she would be teaching and the grade level. Three days ago, she was informed of when she was expected to show up for work.

She’s moving to the region in France she’s always dreamed of living in, and she’s about to start fresh in a new school. But if you had seen her in the car this morning, she was anything but excited about starting her new life.

She spent the whole month solving problems, only to keep finding more. If you ask her, she’s being realistic and down-to-earth. If you ask me, she’s just going through the motions and failing to realize she’s in the midst of one of the most exciting changes in her life! She’s going to be closer to her parents. She’ll be living by the seaside, where she can windsurf as long as the wind blows. She’s going to have sun most of the year from now on!

This morning, as we were about to arrive at the high school where she might teach until the end of her career, I looked up at her, as she was complaining, and asked, “Don’t you think this is amazing?” She replied, “Yeah, I guess so.” I continued:

– “Come on, let’s do something! Think of five positive things right now before we arrive. 1!”

– “We’re not too late.”

– “2!”

– “The weather is good.”

– “3!”

– “I’m about to drink terrible instant coffee and eat overly sweet madeleines in small plastic wrappers with no bin to throw them in.”

– “Okay, Mom, that doesn’t count. Say you’re going to finally meet your colleagues! 4!”

– “Grandpa left me his car, so my old car won’t break down for the third time this month on the most important day of the year.”

– “Okay, not too bad. And 5!”

– “I’m going to visit an apartment I might live in this year after school today!”

– “There you go!”

It’s common to see problems all around you when you’re in survival mode. The human default is to notice the negative before experiencing the positive. However, when you understand that’s just how you’re wired, there are strategies you can apply to gradually rewire your brain.

When things seem negative and I’m self-aware enough to pause and reflect, I try to find five things I’m grateful for. Five things I dream of, am excited about, or look forward to. It’s my way of training my brain to spot more positive things around me—a way to be happier and more content.

I started doing this after reading “The High Five Habit” by Mel Robbins. In her book, she writes, “When you wake up in the morning, write five things you want.” It can be anything—a dream, a relationship, that beach house you might want. Don’t feel guilty for wanting things or overanalyzing it. Help yourself by being honest with yourself. I was also inspired by a short Instagram reel from a speech Oprah gave, where she shared her most effective habit: keeping a gratitude journal.

I began writing every day in a journal. At first, I just kept track of my goals, writing a to-do list of what I wanted to achieve each day. It was just notes and lists. But soon after, it became a place where I opened up to myself with brutal honesty. I would pour out anything, no matter how negative, when I needed to. I’d write my five dreams in the morning when I remembered to do so. And I’d write five things I was grateful for before going to sleep.

Gradually, I believe my mindset really did shift. I gained clarity on what I wanted. I took time to figure out what kind of person I wanted to be. I noted the things I truly appreciated in my day, and then I repeated them, over and over again.

I don’t know if this can help everyone. I mean, if you have a clinical issue or are suffering from depression, the help of a physician is probably more appropriate. However, I believe that for most people, it’s definitely a strategy or a mental habit you can apply in your own way to maybe turn stress into excitement.