The Power of Chocolate Cupcakes

There’s nothing like being robbed on Christmas Eve to get you in the holiday spirit!

I was in a nearby shoe shop buying some last minute gifts for my two oldest girls. (Is it just me, or do all mothers feel like their kids won’t get enough for Christmas?) I was the only customer in the store, so I decided it was okay to set my purse down while I shopped. A few minutes later, an attractive young woman joined me. She distracted me with questions about shoes while her friend, who I never saw, lifted my wallet.

Both girls ran out of the store before I even realized what had happened. They were out of sight by the time I did.

The responses to this unfortunate event ran the gambit with every personality of the DISC model represented.

One of the officers said, “It’s a good thing it was just your wallet, and not your keys.” I agreed that that wouldn’t have been good at all.

The other officer said, “It’s a good thing they didn’t hold a gun to her head is more like it.” He was looking at his partner, so I didn’t respond.

My husband arrived and stayed just long enough to inquire about my state of mind before taking to the streets in search of the thieves.

The storeowner kept offering me the box of cookies she found consolation in, insisting they would make me feel better. To tell her that baking, not eating, cookies was what I needed right then would have probably left her as perplexed as the second officer was by the first’s comment.

Everything was in my wallet. My license, credit cards, checks, membership cards, and, things I couldn’t remember I had (but would miss when I did), were all gone. But, like the wallet itself, these things could all be replaced. The $400 cash I had just gone to the bank for was more regrettable. If only I had used that cash at Sam’s just minutes earlier. Then only $160 would be gone. If only I had been satisfied with the gifts I had already gotten for the girls. Then nothing would be gone.

Except for a nail technician from a nearby shop who said the pair went in for manicures but refused to wait, my husband’s search was unrevealing. Upon hearing this, I thought: “I can’t even remember when I last had a manicure!”

I wanted to get on my computer right then and write out my anger and bitterness, but my son made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.

“Let’s make chocolate cupcakes, mom.”

Well, yes!!!

Okay, being robbed on Christmas Eve might not be just the thing to get you into the holiday spirit, but it certainly wasn’t going to ruin mine.

In fact, I was determined to somehow make sense of what had happened. And what I realized was this:

We process more cautiously after getting robbed, and feel dutiful in telling everyone the details of what happened, “so it doesn’t happen to you”. But reality is, the feelings of upset, regret, anger, and fear subside before your new checks arrive in the mail. Thieves continue to steal with the same tenacity you expressed trying to find the perfect replacement wallet to hold all the replacement junk you’ve accumulated. The cycle continues. And why wouldn’t it?

Nothing really changes because we accept the same. We hide behind words like “victim” and “underprivileged” when “powerful” is what we really are. Within us all is the power to change what is wrong, whether we know it or not. Only when the burden of sharing positive behavior is stronger than acceptance of negative behavior can we realize “powerful”.

I can’t help but think my realizations were influenced by the comment of someone close to me. Of my unfortunate Christmas Eve saga, she said, “I would feel like I was wasting my time trying to help all those kids if I were in your shoes.”

This response is the classic personality trait for a word that begins with the letter "I", only this "I" has nothing to do with the DISC model.

There’s nothing like baking chocolate cupcakes on Christmas Eve to get your mind right!