#42 Gentle Nudge: Release Your Pet Peeves

Ever find yourself stewing over little things—like someone being late or leaving the cupboard open (again)? 🙃 In this episode of Be the Sun, Not the Salt, Dr. Harry Cohen and Connie Fontaine dig into Chapter 21: “Release Your Pet Peeves”—your gentle nudge to let go of those everyday annoyances that just aren’t worth your peace.

What’s the big idea?

• 🧘‍♂️ Let it go, let it go: Holding onto pet peeves only keeps you mildly irritated and robs you of your own peace of mind.
• 🕵️‍♀️ Assume positive intent: Most of the time, people aren’t out to get you—they’re just living their lives (and sometimes running late).
• 💬 Talk it out, don’t stew: Instead of silently judging, try asking a curious question or having a light conversation about what’s bugging you.

Harry shares his classic peeve (lateness!) and how he’s learned (learning?) to smile and move on, while Connie reminds us that a little empathy and a simple question can turn a pet peeve into a non-issue. The real win? Releasing your peeves is less about letting others off the hook and more about protecting your own roots and living a lighter, happier life.

Perfect for anyone who’s ever muttered, “Why do people do that?!” Tune in for relatable stories, practical tips, and your weekly reminder to choose peace over petty. 🌞

(Mini-episode, maximum relief—perfect for your next deep breath!)

Links & Resources

Be the Sun, Not the Salt - book

Episode 29: Gentle Nudge - Assume Positive Intent

To explore the book, or for more episodes, information, tips and tools to live a more heliotropic life, visit us at bethesunnotthesalt.com and find us on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and TikTok.

Transcript

Harry Cohen: Welcome. My name is Harry Cohen, the author of Be the Sun, Not the Salt. And today we're going to be discussing chapter 21, release your pet peeves. And I've got a

Connie Fontaine: I was going to say this gentle nudges is for all of us, which is what every chapter, quite frankly, is for all of us. And we do this work for ourselves and hope that sharing it, um, and talking about it also inspires listeners to, to think about it as well, but this work is ours. So release your pet peeves.

I know, um, everybody knows your primary pet peeve cause we talk about it a lot. And that's people that are late. Um,

Harry Cohen: it in the sense of like, not I'm proud of my peeve. I'm aware of it. And when I see that I'm getting peeved. When someone is late to a zoom or a meeting or anything, I smile and go, ha, [00:01:00] ha, let it go, buddy. Cause I know now that holding onto that peeve is unwise, stupid.

And I used 

Connie Fontaine: why is that unwise and stupid,

Harry Cohen: well, first of all, I'm constantly mindful of how All of us, myself mostly, can be a better human being by recognizing stupid, faulty, not helpful, just plain wrong beliefs and or behaviors and or habits or anything and going, my God, that's stupid. I don't need to do that anymore because it's harmful to me or to other people.

In the case of a pet peeve, it just keeps me mildly irritated and justified in my irritation, which is stupid. I say stupid as in unwise as in that's not necessary. One of my beliefs used to be, and I held it as a sacrosanct absolute, is that anytime someone's late, it [00:02:00] is a sign of disrespect. When in fact, it may or may not be disrespectful, it is for many reasons that people are late. I'm getting on my high horse and copying my attitude Does not serve me or my relationships. Well, I still want to be on, on time and I still think it is better to be on time and other people to be on time. And also when people are late, it's a reminder. Oh, right. Ha ha. Let it go. Harry.

Connie Fontaine: Yeah. And a quote that you, that we put in the book, the Ralph Waldo Emerson, for every minute you remain angry, you give up 60 seconds of peace of mind. So this is about protecting your own roots. It's like, why am I sitting here doing this? Um, when I don't need to,

Harry Cohen: And the anger thing, and there's nothing wrong with anger, but anger on a continuum, there's irritation to, to fury, and you can dial it way back, and I want to dial it [00:03:00] right down to zero, like, huh, easy big fella, take it down a couple of notches, back it off, not that there's anything wrong with saying, hey, I don't find it, um, helpful to keep Us, me waiting for five minutes.

I've noticed the last three times we've met, you know, you, you, you have trouble getting here on time. Let's, let's talk about that. But I'm your point about the anger, irritation, holding onto it. 

Connie Fontaine: mild irritation. It's not healthy. It doesn't. You know, I think the, this one refers back to the, the chapter assume positive intent, which is, you know, is one of my favorites to talk about because it is so easy to judge other people through your own lens. Um, you know, you mentioned it yesterday, you know, I just realized how hard it is to be on time for meetings when you have back to back meetings, you know, and that's, we don't know why somebody is late.

We don't know if they got a call from [00:04:00] school. We don't know if they had another meeting where somebody who was senior to them or somebody who was giving them, you know, information they needed was holding them late. We don't know. Um, and so I think that's the other reason to not be irritated. And I say, asking the questions like you just said, you know, listen, I noticed that these meetings start late frequently.

Is there something we can do? Should we start the meeting 15 minutes after the hour? Would that help you? because I know it causes people stress to be late. So to come in and feel like already judged and in trouble, isn't good for them either.

Harry Cohen: And I think it, we were just talking about being late, but there's a million things that

irritate human be, us, human beings. It's okay and normal and healthy. It's not wrong. It's not like we're laying a big trip. You shouldn't have those peeves. Leaving cupboards open, leaving a mess, you know, doing things that bother us. It's important to identify them, talk about them, you know, release your peeve if you can, or talk to the person about what [00:05:00] it is that's bothering you. But don't make it bigger or smaller than it need be. I think that's the lesson for me. And I, again, I hope that these gentle nudges, this conversation or awareness helps people live a more heliotropic life.

What do we mean? It means they're better with other people and themselves. Their life is enhanced because they were able to let go of some mild irritation More easily. That's our wish.

Connie Fontaine: When I think the trick that I've, um, learned partly because it's a great way to start a conversation is to ask the question instead of Come at it from a point of judgment, you know, you talk about let's use an easy one leaving the cupboards open or look whatever leaving Here's a good one because I do this not not screwing the jar or it's closing something all the way and I don't know why I do that, but drives my husband nuts like but ask me why what do you are you thinking about this when you do it?

[00:06:00] I'd rather do that than be like, oh my god, you're so ridiculous. Why do you always do that? So I think asking the question makes me, I think have a healthier conversation about my pet peeve versus going, Hey, you are always late. You always do this. Those are never healthy conversations. Yeah. Right.

Harry Cohen: option, which is, Hey honey, could you make an effort to close the jars tightly? Sure. No problem. Done.

Connie Fontaine: exactly. Like, that's so embarrassing. Yeah, of course. I don't mean to, I don't know what I'm thinking at the time, but yeah, I don't know if there's another pet peeve you can think of, but they're so easily resolved half the time in a conversation with somebody versus just that judgment and sitting and stewing in judgment.

Harry Cohen: Exactly. The sitting and stewing in judgment. Why don't people use their blinkers when they change lanes? I don't understand.

Connie Fontaine: Well, that's a,

Harry Cohen: The

phrase, the phrase that gets me is, [00:07:00] I don't know why people and then fill in the blank. Yeah. What about you? You're a people, 

Connie Fontaine: Yup. We're people too.

Harry Cohen: I want us to look in the mirror and really, you know, grow as we age. This work for me is about. Wisdom work, not being more clever, not learning anything, maybe unlearning just as much as learning, but how can I live my life more wisely, therefore more health fully, if that's a word.

Connie Fontaine: I love that. Unlearning. That's a really good, unlearning certain habits and certain judgments. 

So I hope you enjoyed our conversation about letting go of your pet peeves. Please let us know what peeves you've been able to let go and how you did it so you can help somebody else out. Don't collect them. Don't send us your list of peeves. Send us, if you will, how you've let go of some peeves that you've held on to for many, many days, weeks, months, or years, or decades. [00:08:00] And we'll help a bunch of people. Follow us on any of the platforms and like and share. And let's figure out how we can do more good together.

We could help each other. It's great. Thanks for listening.