Friction burn

Can frustration be good for us?

We store our tupperware in a kitchen drawer that’s deep enough to hold it all, mismatched lids and discoloured tubs aplenty. This is a significant upgrade from storing it in the skinny cupboard jammed like an afterthought between the sink and dishwasher in our old place. Back then I would feel my patience clutch as I went to open it every day, knowing that various items would clatter out around me as I squatted to the floor on aging knees. It didn’t matter what order or logic I’d try to impose on the organisation of this plastic hellscape, the tupperware cupboard and I were insufferable roommates. It’s a great example of a domestic friction for which there is no obvious or immediate fix. You just end up living with it.

It's all over the place but at least it doesn't fall on me anymore

I’ll admit that the prospect of having an empty plastic box fall on me from zero height is laughable as far as stress triggers go, but we shouldn’t underestimate what persistent frustration does to our body. When we experience frustration of any kind, we experience a surge in cortisol and adrenalin as the amygdala takes over to work out if we need to fight or flee. At this level the body doesn’t know you’re just staring down a wall of tupperware, so it’s getting ready to deal with the worst case scenario by flooding us with stress hormones that increase our heart rate, quicken our breathing, and tense our muscles. Is it an orange-stained takeaway box you saved ‘just in case’ or a sabre-toothed tiger? The amygdala doesn’t have time for details, girl!

When we repeatedly experience frustration, we repeatedly flush our bodies with stress hormones which impacts on our health. In the immediate aftermath of frustration, we’re more irritable and impatient because our emotional regulation has briefly shut down, and over the long-term repeated stress experiences can contribute to poor sleep, higher blood pressure, reduced immunity and declines in relationships and wellbeing.

I hadn’t accounted for how badly this particular friction smarted until we had a better tupperware solution in a new home. It wasn’t even intentional, it was just… where it went? It made me think of all the other frictions I had tolerated for all those years, and how many of us are living in ways that rub like a perpetual stone in our shoe. Frustration seems jammed into daily life, but does it have to be this way?

Ahead of our recent move, a great deal of these kinds of frictions came to the surface because we had an out. I suppose it’s easier to talk about the things that hurt when you know there’s a solution, rather than just relentlessly complain. The relief at knowing it was the last time I’d need to carry my toddler, a bike and bags of shopping up four flights of stairs in one go. The deep exhale when I only had to tolerate one more month / week / day of steering a family of four out of the door through a hallway that was also our kitchen. Knowing I’d be able to shut the bedroom door properly; put the cat litter tray in a utility room; not have to listen to the neighbours taking a shower at 6am when I lay in bed. The list went on and on.

You could chalk a lot of this up to small-space living. There were only so many places we could stash a litter tray so our cat could actually use it, and without an advanced degree in quantum mechanics I was unsure how to remedy a solution for tupperware storage or find a way for my children to enter our home without using the door. But more space doesn’t guarantee less friction, just like moving house doesn’t instantly make you a different person. Wherever you go, there you are; frustration is in the eye of the beholder, after all.

But for all the ways frustration feels bad for us, it’s also very helpful. Research shows that experiencing frustration is a cornerstone for how we learn, adapt and grow. Just think about a baby who repeatedly falls over as they attempt to master bipedal life. That’s frustration in action, as you watch their chubby faces screwed up in rage whilst they pratfall again and again. I remember my son’s exasperated little yelps, as he’d slap his hands on the floor for the thousandth time. He was wild with frustration but he was going to BLOODY. DO. THIS. WALKING. THING. Get up, get up, get up again.

I thought of this at the weekend as I took our new electric cargo bike out for a test drive. As someone who re-learned to ride a bike as an adult and can’t drive a car, I’m not the smoothest of transport operators and the prospect of riding a revved up three-wheeler with my babies inside makes me panic. I can confirm that panic is not a useful emotion to have when you’re in moving traffic. So off I went for a practice ride around our extremely quiet suburban block, turning corners whilst slow enough to be almost stationary and screaming under my breath whenever a car came towards me. I kept telling myself that everyone is a beginner at some point, but Jesus H. Christ it was FRUSTRATING. I wanted to abandon the whole prospect there and then, to flee rather than fight, but I know deep down that the only way is through. Get up, get up, get up again.

In these moments, frustration can awaken the conscious mind, point to the things we want to achieve or fix, and arouse the problem-solving parts of our brains. Research shows that students who sit with frustration and failure as they attempt an exercise repeatedly, are more likely to remember the learning outcome whilst building resilience and lifelong problem-solving skills. (I could write a manifesto about the massive downsides of cognitive offloading from using AI if anyone wants one….). So what does this mean for the kinds of frustrations we chalk up to human existence and domestic life?

Some frictions are in the daily grind, like where to store recycling or hang coats, and some are more existential, like finding privacy to think. They all boil down to the same thing: something is getting in the way of my goal. Thinking about the emotional needs we have of the home, frustration cuts across our experience of comfort and control which is when we most likely feel it regularly, but it also cuts across accomplishment and aspiration. When we look at frustration through this expanded emotional lens, we have a deeper pool of resources to draw from that range from quick functional solutions to shifts in mindset and behaviour. In my book, I call these ‘Hands and Heart’ solutions. So let’s have a go:

The 5-minute Fix

Do you need to replace a lightbulb, tighten a screw, patch a hole, grease a wheel, throw it away? I’m with Michelle Ogundehin on this one: do it now. Like, literally now. Stop reading this, go and do it, and meet me back here. So many of the things we live with that drive us silently mad are things we can resolve in minutes, yet somehow we can’t get beyond it and resort to stewing in cortisol for the zillionth time. Use this as permission to get the thing fixed and cross it off your list.

Ask A Better Question

Sometimes we get frustrated about things that, on the surface, seem quite innocuous, but are actually deeply rooted weeds that thread back to some relational or identity stuff we’ve not dealt with. Am I mad about the tupperware? Or do I hate making packed lunches because of what it makes me feel about the drudgery of motherhood? (Clover Stroud nails the packed lunch hell here btw). Maybe it’s both, but asking better questions to yourself can help unpack (pun intended) the kinds of crap you carry around for years that come to the surface every time the stress hormones flood in.

Find The ‘Why’ or Make One Up

For years—years—my husband and I watched as a small leak silently dripped from a pipe in the bathroom onto our tiled floor, and we did nothing about it until we had people come for sales viewings and we finally called the plumber who fixed it in less than 20 minutes. Having a deadline or audience is a powerful motivator to get out of your own way for a hot minute. Sometimes I joke that it took me having my second child to finally find the time to write a book, but the truth is that the reason for writing it superseded all the objectively painful frustrations I had in my way, from a lack of a private space to write, to any control over my waking or sleeping hours. My ‘why’ was so deep that even if I only managed eight minutes of coherent writing time on any given day, I knew it was better than none. I still experienced the frustration, but I didn’t feel it in my body in the same way as before.

Reframe The Frustration

I’m learning! This pain is all part of growth! I’m frustrated because I’m getting better! It feels like a real stretch when your badly designed kitchen makes you curse every day or you’ve run out of places to store your shoes, but even the smallest of grievances are moments to reflect. Maybe there’s another way to do it? Or maybe it’s prompting you to reconsider what’s important in your home? I was talking to a friend about the overwhelm of parenting and she told me that recently she had started reframing it as ‘abundance’. Look at all this abundance in my life! Just spilling out everywhere! We laughed about it, but she’s onto something. It doesn’t make it go away, but perhaps reframing can make the frustration more of the feature than the bug.

*****

And as for me, I’ve got another cargo bike driving lesson (or 20, let’s be real) on the cards. My friend told me that after about ten minutes I’d get the hang of it, which is an exhilarating compliment but also evidently untrue given my first hair-raising rodeo attempt. I take it to mean that it’s all figure-outable eventually, so long as I give it enough grit. So I’ll see you round the block, silently screaming under my breath—just as soon as I’ve cleaned my daughter’s lunchbox and found a place for it to go.