Personal Meditation No. 158

“You are not making people angry by your choices. You do not make anyone else anything they are not already.”

Embrace the Within.

I deal with this situation a lot in both my personal and professional life. You probably have this situation as well because there are a lot of us out there trying to change people into something they are not and a lot of us being told that our choices are making other folks feel any number of emotions. You might even have a combination of both of these situations occur simultaneously. I know I have and I just want to assure you that neither situation is a possibility.

I have spoken a number of times about changing people and the only way that happens is internally. And that can be quite frustrating for us in some professions. When you look at how teachers take every child as their own personal success or failure, there is no wonder that most feel the burnout. A lot of what got them into education at first was this idea of changing the world and then they ran into the psychological truth about humans. We can influence and nudge them in certain directions, however, we cannot change them into something they are not. And that certainty about human nature is proven time and time again in psychological study after study, yet, we tend to believe we are the ones that are going to make the change. We adopt this belief of changing others in our professional and personal lives and it leads to countless problems.

Additionally, we cannot feel responsible for the way other people feel about our decisions. We are responsible for how we act and we need to take responsibility for how we act BUT that does not mean responsibility for how others feel about how we act. We cannot control how anyone might react to our choices and that is not our responsibility. Our responsibility lies in making the best choices for our lives and our journey. Does that mean we cannot have empathy? Does that mean we have no attachments? That’s just silly. BUT, ten percent of the folks are going to hate you no matter what you do and ten percent will love you no matter what you do, you have to focus on positively influencing the eighty percent with whom we can move the needle. That other twenty percent is solidly in one camp or the other.

People are not going to change until they choose to change and they choose to change from the influences around them. So, being the person that focuses on your own personal change will influence the change in others. You and I cannot make anyone behave anyway they are not already going to behave BUT we can nudge and influence them into making better choices. And if we truly care about what we’re doing in our own lives then the best instrument of change is to live the example.

We cannot be weapons of change using violence and anger to beat and berate folks into changing. We are not the cops of change. We need to use the compassion and love we gain from working on our own change to influence the change in others. You cannot change anyone BUT yourself. BUT changing yourself can change everything and everyone around you. It can totally change the direction of your life.

Two years ago I was beating and berating the world around me into changing to fit my image. Now I am peacefully spreading the message by working on me. It is not easy or quick BUT it is worth the struggle and time because I deserve to be better.

Have the day you want. I hope you find whatever you’re looking for.

#ThinkBetter #BeBetter #NoGodsNoMasters #MyBodyMyChoice #MakeYourselfGreatAgain