Personal Meditation No. 87

“It’s not all in your mind but if you don’t control your mind, then the rest doesn’t matter.”

Embrace the Within

I spend some of my time with my friends talking them down from overreacting to media. That I am the voice of reason in these conversations is troubling to me but doesn’t seem to bother those that come to me with their complaints. Maybe it’s the white hair and beard that sets them at ease? Maybe it’s that I take it all in stride? Maybe that I have this amor fati attitude about life and living?

Everything is a challenge. I face the same challenges that you do in life. The difference is the pause and the choice that comes after the pause. Whenever we are faced with a challenge or a stimulus, we get to instantly react or pause and respond. Think of how your body instantly reacts with “knee-jerk” responses to physical stimuli. Those are involuntary reflexes. A lot of us have developed those responses to thoughts. We “knee-jerk” and react rather than using our brain to consider our response.

A lot of that develops from a place of protection. Lashing out and making yourself alone is a reaction against feeling hurt again by others and so we cause the pain ourselves. We have so many ways to react rather than respond that books are written about and clinicians dedicate their practices to these coping mechanisms. But they’re not coping with anything. They’re covering up and walling around the real problem without ever solving the problem.

When you get “triggered”, that is the time to figure out why. That is the time to work on you and not on someone else. So, when the media makes you feel triggered, think about why you’re feeling that way. Most times it is a problem we need to fix in ourselves.

I can’t change the world without changing myself first. Change yourself today? Don’t let the world control how you react . . . Take control of how you respond?

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

#ThinkBetter #BeBetter #MyBodyMyChoice #MakeYourselfGreatAgain