Saturday, December 3, 2016
Stop Blaming your Body
Who you are right now is a direct result of your programming. Our brain is our processer. If your computer isn’t processing properly, you don’t change the screen (body)...you check the processor.
The quality of the processing is dependent upon the input. If the input is flawed…so is the processing
Isn’t it funny how we say, “I want to change my body”…when in fact, it’s not the body that needs changing, it’s our mind. The body is a reflection of the mind…just like the computer screen is reflecting the input.
Think about this…
-Who you are right now is the result of the programs you have received up until now.
-What you want for yourself and from life is the result of those same programs.
-Who you are, starting today, is the result of the new choices you begin to make today.
-What you want out of life (starting today) is up to the choices you decide to make now.
“Whatever can happen at any time can happen today”
Today is the day!
Monday, August 1, 2016
Fake It Until You Make It
“Man’s mind once stretched by a new idea, never
regains its original dimensions”
Oliver
Wendell Holmes
As an admitted
self-talk, introspective, skeptic, and somewhat cynical (realistJ) person, I can tell you
this with complete conviction: these traits are an extremely helpful mishmash
of well discerned cognitive processes when it is used in an effort to serve
others; however, it is dangerous, pessimistic, and self-destructive when the talk,
thoughts, and actions are internalized and left un-checked.
All psychological
studies show that our internal dialogue has an impact on what we think, and therefore how we feel.
Our internal dialogue creates our perspective…our perspective creates our
internal dialogue.
The thoughts and
dialogue become so intertwined that it’s almost impossible to recognize the
“self” from the thoughts.
Eckhart Tolle once said,
“what a liberation to realize that the
'voice in my head' is not who I am.” ‘Who am I, then?' “I am the one observing
the voice”
So how do we begin this journey of
self-enlightenment?
Becoming enlightened
begins with presence. You have to be in the moment long enough to recognize the
internal chatter that most times are filled with negative self-destructive
thoughts.
One of the most
beneficial practices I have ever used in an effort to control/understand my thoughts
is called Neuro Linguistic Programing (NLP).
Neuro-Brain/Awareness
Linguistic-Words/Thoughts
Programming-Input/Processing
I’m not trying to talk
to you like you’re a third grader; however, breaking down complex sounding
programs can be very helpful in understanding the true meaning.
Let me begin by saying
that most psychologist disagree with NLP. I think the discrediting has more to
do with some of the claims made by many “self-help” gurus than it does the
obvious benefits that occur from rationally discerned thoughts and the creation
of new dialogue.
The slander regarding
NLP and is probably not intentional. It seems to me to be a misunderstanding of
what NLP is. And I lay the blame for that at the feet of an awful lot of people
who have "sold" NLP (just as
the health industry “sold” diet plans) as a self-help method, a way to
control other people, and as a quick fix for every problem. NLP is none of
those things, but without selling to the sizzle of NLP, they wouldn’t make any
money.
What is NLP?
NLP is personal
awareness, recognition/changing the internal dialogue, and modeling behavior of
successful people.
If someone is good at
something and I want to be good at it, I can learn from how they do it … how
they think about it… what they believe about it, what they consider to be
important… what they pay attention to and what they ignore… the sequence of
mental and physical steps they follow…and so on. Modeling allows you to
implement a well-traveled successful path to do get similar results quickly.
Not necessarily instantly, as it depends on how much actual practice is
required, but much more quickly than a path less traveled. You learned a lot of
what you know by means of trial and error, making mistakes and learning from
them, throwing away what doesn't work and keeping what does. It's possible for
all of us to learn the steps of success (mentally and physically) from those
successful people who came before us.
Internal Dialogue:
People ask me all the
time. “How do you eat the same thing
every day?”…I respond, “How could I
not eat the same food every day?”
I intentionally say what
I want to be true.
The next comment is
usually, “Oh…so what you’re saying is
fake it until you make it”?
Absolutely not! What I’m
saying is become aware of your thoughts (internal
dialogue) and see if it is in line with your goals. If you’re saying, “I’ll never be able to eat right”, then
most likely you’re right.
Awareness the first
step, the second step is writing down your goals and the words necessary to
achieve those goals.
If weight loss is the
goal, replace, “I’ll never lose weight” with “I’m going to become healthy”.
Just because you’re
replacing negative words with goal driven words doesn’t mean you’re faking
it…it means you are thinking rationally (action)
rather than emotionally (acceptance).
Rational discernment is
the road less traveled. It’s akin to swimming upstream; there will always be
resistance coming from the familiar steam of habitual emotional reactions.
Emotional thinking is
strong and reactive. They can carry you downstream with little or no effort. If
you jump into a river and don’t swim, you end up where the river takes you. If
you swim, it will be hard; however, you will have better control of your
destination.
Changing the destination
is changing perception...its learning to see things in a clearer truer
perspective with less biases. Everyone sees the world different. Two people can
have the same experience, yet have very different interpretations of what
happened.
NLP won't make you a
CEO, but if you are a CEO, it'll make you a better one. The same is true no
matter your goal, vocation or avocation. Implementing NLP won't solve all your
life’s problems; however, it'll allow you to become more aware of your old
patterns of thinking, to a new pattern of perceiving that will allow you to be
more successful and achieve all you’ve ever dreamed of.
“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way”
-Viktor E. Frankl
Friday, June 17, 2016
No Matter Where you go… There you are.
“Mindfulness is the art of mastering your life, not running away from it”
Shelly once complained about the sound of her
neighbor’s sprinkler system going off in the middle of the night. The neighbor
pointed out, "it only comes on one time per week and there is only one
sprinkler by your house". Shelly replied, “But you don’t know what I go through
waiting for it to come on.”
Shelly assumed she could resolve this issue by sleeping in another room on the other side of the house. The first night was great! However, it didn’t take long before she began to noticed the neighbor’s air condition unit turning on and off.
The moral to this story is that you can move to a
different room, house, city, or state, but no matter where you go, there you
are. Most times, left undiscerned, our emotions interfere with our ability to
use logic and reason.
The events (water
sprinkler, a/c unit) that Shelly was anxious about are nothing more than
events that occur in most neighborhoods. What is different is our perception
about the events. If you resist or hyper focus on the “sprinklers”, you will
make yourself anxious about the “sprinklers”. The resistance/hyper-focus on the
sprinklers creates anticipatory anxiety…this guarantees ones thoughts about a
certain event are precisely what bring about the anxiety of the event.
The solution isn’t avoiding/resisting the thoughts
about the event…the solution involves something known as the R.A.I.N. Method.
Recognize
Allow
Investigate
Non-identify
(Look at the situation as if it’s not
you…what would you recommend to a friend with this problem?)
In the beginning, the method of facing rather than
fleeing may be uncomfortable. However,
by changing one meaningful attachment to the situation by “allowing” rather
than “resisting” creates a cognitive shift in perception that allows you to
live a life unfettered by the smallest
annoyances. (It’s not about what
happened…it’s what we “think” about what happened)
Things don’t change…we change.
Monday, June 6, 2016
Hope
"Can anything be more idiotic than
certain people who boast of their foresight? They keep themselves officiously
preoccupied in order to improve their lives; they spend their lives in
organizing their lives. They direct their purposes with an eye to a distant
future. But putting things off is the biggest waste of life: it snatches away
each day as it comes, and denies us the present by promising the future. The
greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses
today. You are arranging what lies in Fortune’s control, and abandoning what
lies in yours. What are you looking at? To what goal (Hope) are you straining?”
― Seneca, On the Shortness of LifeTo my surprise, a couple of friends thought the stoic philosophy wasn’t optimistic enough, and contained too much negativity…they said, “It didn’t leave much room for hope”. The word “hope” stuck with me for a second. It really made me think of how a Stoic would feel about this characterization of their belief system.
To a Stoic,
the past and future do not exist. There is only the present moment.
(Anyone who has ever read any of
Eckhart Tolle’s teachings will notice how he was heavily influenced by the
Stoic philosophy)
So according
to the Stoics, attaching oneself to the past or by “hoping” for a better future devalues the present and prevents one from living life to its fullest. Stoicism then articulated what Freud would
echo centuries later that… “He who
remains a prisoner of the past will always be incapable of acting and
enjoying." The same applies to
the person who is living for tomorrow, always waiting for their life to begin.
Hope, according to Stoic thought, is by
nature an absence, a lack, a source of constant tension because we live our
lives in terms of plans, hoping for
some distant goal on which our happiness depends.
Webster’s
Dictionary defines Hope…To cherish a
desire with anticipation…to desire
with expectation of obtainment…to expect with confidence. (I’ve highlighted these words to show the
extreme expectations that are attached to the future desires of hopes)
You might
ask, “What about goal setting?”
Goals are
different…Hope in achieving a goal is a
desire that has been clearly defined and
is planned with action. Hope, in
the way most people use it, is a wishful desire… a dream….lacking a clear
direction. A future thought that depends on future contingencies that most
times are not thought out and beyond our control.
Again…flawed
expectations.
The Danger of Unrealistic Hopes and Goals:
Goals have
their issues too. If one reaches their goal, they may experience a puzzling
sense of disillusionment and immediately our desires force us into “hoping” for
the next distant goal.
"We wait for life as life
passes" is the
famous phrase by the Stoic philosopher Seneca. The good life then, is a life
stripped of both hopes and fears. Hoping for happiness is to "seek it where it is not and neglect to
seek it where is it" -Epictetus.
I’m also an
avid reader of Buddhism. I was surprised to discover this Stoic philosophy was
also echoed in the Buddhist teachings.
“You must learn to live as if this
present moment was the most vital of your life. For nothing else exists in
truth: the past is no longer and the future is not yet".
Even Nietzsche
weighed in against hope… “We 'shoulder' like 'beasts of burden'
because of our inability to love reality for itself.”
Our reality
is our reality…and sometimes that may be depressing (that’s a personal perspective); however, the unrealistic,
unexamined expectations of future hopes
are destructive patterns of thoughts that permeate into other areas of our lives
as well.
French
philosophy Andre Comte-Sponville points out that "to hope is to desire without consummation, without knowledge, without
power".
To desire
without consummation because by definition we do not have what we hope for… to desire without knowledge because if we knew how to obtain the object of our
desires, then we would do so… desire without power because, again, if we had
the power to obtain our desires, we would do so. Hope then according to Andre leads to
frustration and impotence.
Hope highlights an important
difference between Christianity and Stoicism…
Christianity
teaches the world is not as it should be and that we live in a cursed and
fallen world…we are sinners, unworthy, and decrepit. We therefore “hope” for the grace of God and for the
Kingdom of God and for our own salvation.
(*note...I
do not believe this is the message of Jesus)
Stoicism, on
the other hand, aims to understand and appreciate the world we live in and accept
our place within it. Good or bad, we have an opportunity to experience.
“Life is happening for us…not to us.
Every moment is a chance to learn…a chance to understand”
Christianity
teaches dissatisfaction and despair can only be defeated by hope. Stoicism teaches despair is caused
by making faulty judgments on the world, that hope is at best worthless.
Stoicism is
a practice of reason, logic, and living in the present moment. It’s about
realistic expectations and facing the ugly realities of life (Lies, stealing, cheating, deceptions,
depressions, anxiety, and death) that are out of our control.
However, by
accepting the cold hard realities of our condition, Stoicism allows us to
appreciate the beautiful opportunities that await those who willfully
acknowledge the ebbs and flows of life knowing that it’s all going to be ok.
“No
man is free unless he is master of himself”
-Epictetus
Friday, April 8, 2016
Dukkha (Suffering)
I'm taking a college course right now (Buddhism and Modern Psychology) and loving it! It is fascinating how close the Buddha was to explaining the drives/desires/sufferings of man.
Part of my test was to write an essay regarding human suffering...I thought it might make an excellent blog.
Buddhism and Human Suffering
The word
“Dukkha” is used by the Buddha with regard to human suffering. Dukkha is a cognitive conundrum for all
conscious creatures. It’s the neurological conflict between intense cravings,
and our inability to satiate those cravings. Though satisfaction may occur, it
is only for a fleeting moment, and then another need arises.
Buddha referred to the cravings/needs cycle as “attachment”. In psychology, this is known as the hedonic treadmill.
The awareness of suffering is the recognition of primordial cravings in a modern world that has been created by natural selection. Dukkha is and will always be a cognitive conundrum for all conscious creatures.
Part of my test was to write an essay regarding human suffering...I thought it might make an excellent blog.
Question 1: The Buddha offers a specific
diagnosis of the suffering that is part of human existence. Explain the
Buddha's diagnosis. Does this diagnosis ring true to you, or has the Buddha
ignored some aspect of human life, or made some other mistake? Offer two specific
reasons or experiences that support your answer, and explain how they support
it.
Buddha referred to the cravings/needs cycle as “attachment”. In psychology, this is known as the hedonic treadmill.
If peace is
what we desire, detachment from “things” is required.
We are all
fighting a neurological battle that has been forged by millions of years of
natural selection. Our brain was hardwired in a much different world; food was
scarce, safety was a concern, and reproduction was a must.
The drive
for Survival and reproduction is ironically dependent on human suffering. Because we suffer, we are never
satisfied. Because we are never
satisfied, we stay motivated to survive and reproduce.
I believe
the diagnosis is right on because it is supported by evolutionary biology. The Buddha basically predicted what science
has confirmed.
For example:
In my
younger years, my expectations were unrealistic. I thought that buying_____
would make a long term difference in my state of mind. The reality showed me
otherwise…the short term excitement (dopamine) was fleeting. It was at that
point I realized that we always come back to a certain level of consciousness.
(I.e. sad, up/down, content)
As Buddha
pointed out...”If you’re not happy
without, you won’t be happy with”
Owning a
business has also taught me that suffering is necessary until “I” decide it’s
not necessary. Becoming angry because someone didn’t show up to work only hurts
me. What’s happened has happened, and no
amount of anger is going to change the present moment. The instant I become
aware of this fact, suffering is no longer an issue.The awareness of suffering is the recognition of primordial cravings in a modern world that has been created by natural selection. Dukkha is and will always be a cognitive conundrum for all conscious creatures.
Hence, the
wisdom of Buddha and the irony of evolution.
Monday, March 28, 2016
Clarifying Thoughts
“Know thyself. The unexamined life is not worth living”
~ Socrates
~ Correcting Inaccurate Thoughts
~
Become the witness to the thoughts (internal
dialogue). “You are not the voice in your head…you are the observer of the
voice.”
The voice in your head is the
ego…the ego is a pseudo reality. It’s a collection of consciousness created by
our subjective perception of “our” world.
~ Emotional Awareness ~
Become aware of the emotions.
(Thoughts-feelings-behaviors)
Stop using emotional reasoning.
Intellect comes second to emotions.
We need to re-establish critical
thinking with thoughts-feelings-actions.
Emotions are questionable and
delude critical thinking.
~ Cognitive Distortions
~
Cognitive distortions are
irrational thoughts that fuel your emotions.
Catastrophizing, all-or-nothing,
overgeneralization, emotional reasoning, Fortune telling, and mind
reading.
Disputing negative
thoughts…correcting your thinking. Awareness teaches you to make your
mind work for you through critical thinking…not against you with emotional
thoughts. Clarify and evaluate every thought.
Clarifying thoughts allows us to
discern between what’s in our best interest, and what’s not. It’s important to
note that our brain is indifferent to whether we have happy, meaningful lives.
The main function of the brain is wired to have an insatiable appetite for
survival and reproduction. This is a very important part of understanding
behaviors when it comes to knowing who we are, and why we do what we do.
Aristotle
Wednesday, March 23, 2016
Privilege
“When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive — to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love” — Marcus Aurelius
(Early morning walk = fixed routine for my mornings)
I’m up at 4:30,
shower, make breakfast, and spend 10-15 minutes reading. This sets in motion a calm, fueled, and
purposeful beginning for the day.
“The way you do anything is the way
you do everything”Since that last blog, I have had many people ask what my choice of reading is. My reading predominately consists of non-fiction text pertaining to health, fitness, nutrition, psychology, philosophy, and neural science.
(I prefer the type of reading that
creates gravitas within a person)
I would say
my reading style is akin to Bible study… it's not a huge pile of books you
never get to the end of, it's the repeated reading of small but important philosophical
and scientific bodies of work. Books that remind you of things you've forgotten
and want to change, noticing new things, reinterpreting old things in the light
of new experiences, and a profound understanding in light of new scientific
knowledge.
Re-reading a
book is like stepping into a river…. You never touch the same water twice,
because the flow that has passed will never pass again. People, like the river,
are ever changing. Each time we read, we are not the same person who reads it
again… therefore new knowledge/perspective is acquired on every reading.
We all have
the same 24 hours in a day and we choose how we start it…so choose wisely.
I promise
you, the 10-15 minutes you set aside for your literary experience will not only
add brightness to your day, but it will add peace, purpose and meaning to your
life.
“Seize the day; enjoy the present, as
opposed to placing all hope in the future”
Carpe Deim
Wednesday, February 24, 2016
Distorted Mirror Syndrome (DMS)
“Nothing is good or bad, but thinking
you looks better or worse than you do, does make it bad”
~ Shakespeare
There is help.
What Are the Treatments for DMS?
Depending on the type and stage of DMS, treatments to eradicate the delusion or slow its growth may include some combination of psychotherapy, radical honesty, or a mirror placed in an unexpected located.
(Have you ever seen yourself in a mirror and thought, “Hey, who’s that fat guy”…and it turns out to be you?)
DMS Support
Supportive
care from family’s and other mental professionals should accompany DMS treatment.
The goal is to relieve pain from those who have to be around you, maintain a
body that looks close to what you think it looks like, general health (for your friends), improve quality of
life (for your friends), and provide
emotional, and psychological, support to the DMS patients and the poor soul who
are forced to be in the same work environment with them. Similar supportive
treatment is also available to rehabilitate patients post DMS treatment.
Supportive Therapy
~ Most
mainstream care is geared toward providing supportive treatment through the
broad resources of a DMS treatment center (this
is also for victims of friends). Complementary DMS therapies, which are
generally provided outside a gym, can also provide supportive care.
~ Join support groups who are post DMS and now realistic
about their bodies…this can provide relief from pain and other irreversible
symptoms that come from delusional thinking.
~ Friends
who don’t allow you to continue to lie to yourself.
~ Tailors…tailors
can be helpful in making suggestions on appropriate clothing so you don’t
embarrass your children or disgust your friends and family.
~Mirror
therapy…the mirror is the way. Ironically, what created the delusion… repairs
the delusion. (Remember to place mirror
in unexpected locations…for the shock factor)
These are
just a few suggestions that can fight this irrational disease for the DMS
patient, and lead improved quality of life for friends, family members, and
co-workers.
Together we
can all fight this horrible neurosis.
~ Kelly
Wednesday, February 10, 2016
Are you ok? How bout those Cowboys!
“Most people tend to delude
themselves into thinking that freedom comes from doing what feels good or what
fosters comfort and ease. The truth is that people who subordinate reason to
their feelings (deflect-my interpretation) of the moment are actually slaves of
their desires and aversions. They are ill prepared to act effectively and nobly
when unexpected challenges occur, as they inevitably will” ---Epictetus.
Example…
The conversation seems too personal (hits too close to home), the relationship becomes too intense, the eye contact too direct, and the feelings too real…. so we deflect the full impact of reality and pretend to be satisfied with something less.
People who struggle with health and nutrition issues spend a lot of their time deflecting. This can make it extremely difficult to help on many levels; people are misinformed about nutrition and content with their knowledge….they are unaware of the relationship/attachments they have associated with food and don’t want to talk about it, and never satisfied with what they have. They always want more without doing the specific work because it would require recognition of self.
Deflectors
have a hard time clarifying what they really want, or looking at their past
history in an authentic way, so they frantically try to fill up the ever
expanding void with materialistic objects or helpless personal conditions which
prevent them from ever taking responsibility. (Existential vacuum and victimization)
Deflection
forces us to make contact with our desires in a halfhearted, dampened down way,
and so we always leave an experience with the vague feeling that we were
cheated, or that there has to be something more. Since you unconsciously lie to
yourself about the reason that your contact was unfulfilling, you are likely to
project this feeling and blame on others; husband, wife, family, friends, job
or government for a problem that really belongs to you.
Like all the
issues we would like to change, deflection can also serve a vital function for the
individual. Some memories are too painful and some realities too unacceptable.
Deflection allows a person to not experience the painful/difficult moments in
life. This pattern will always prohibit the true autonomy that one seeks on his
or her journey toward enlightenment.
If cognitive
liberation is what you seek, then facing internal and external issues are the
most important step in personal transformation. (If you can’t face it, you can’t fix it). Challenge yourself in a way that attacks
the issues you avoid, rather than suppressing the delusional past.
“Mindfulness is the art of mastering
your life, not running away from it”
The next
time you feel an emotion that triggers avoidance, ask yourself, “What’s the worst thing that can happen?” You’ll find that the temporary pain of
honest recognition is worth the lifelong contentment that emerges from a life
lived acknowledging reality. Monday, January 18, 2016
Thinking Consciously, Consciously Thinking
“Not to be able to stop thinking is a
dreadful affliction, but we don't realize this because almost everyone is
suffering from it, so it is considered normal. This incessant mental noise
prevents you from finding that realm of inner stillness that is inseparable
from Being” - Eckhart Tolle
The Secret,
Deepak Chopra, and many other self-help experts are growing in popularity based
on the premise of “Awareness”. These
books have become THE answer to our inability to achieve happiness and peace in
our lives.
People use
the words “Awareness” and “Mindfulness” much like the way we through around the
word “Love”. Unfortunately, from this
perspective, an immature understanding is developed that clearly trivializes
and undervalues what it truly means to become “Aware”.
Awareness is
a real technique used in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) for making
fundamental discoveries about “who we are”, and “why we do what we do”. It’s a great tool in understanding the true
nature of the programed mind.
There is a thought
pattern that creates the way we understand “our world” and everyone in it. We perceive… we attach… an emotion arises… a
behavior is evoked… followed by a (good/bad) consequence.
We take our
“subjective view” (projection) as the “objective view” about the nature of
reality. We’re not aware of the fact
that our “truths” are based on our “subjective experiences”.
As Cuban
author Anais Nin once said, “We don’t see
things as they are; we see them as we are”.
This sense
of self is an illusion. Breaking through this illusion of self is more
important than stress reduction of the other traditionally viewed benefits
talked about by the authors above.
The enemy of
mindfulness is being lost in thought. To be thinking without knowing you’re
thinking. The problems are not the thoughts themselves, but the actual lack of
intentional conscious thought that occurs. (Most of us spend our entire lives thinking without knowing what we are thinking)
This autonomic thought process places a darkly colored veil over the present moment and distorts our lives with anxiety filled emotions which engineers our unhappiness and discontent.
Think about
it…most of what we think is quite unpleasant.
We’re judging ourselves, judging others… We create anticipatory anxiety
from future thought, and have depression from regrets of the past.
Awareness of
these unhealthy thoughts is a valuable tool for breaking through the deafening
sounds of society. It allows us to rise
above the illusionary sense of self by observing the repetitive internal
dialogue within ourselves. This, in and of itself, is extremely beneficial.
This type of
awareness brings forth a whole new understanding to our experiences that we
didn’t notice in the past.
Take anger
for instance. Instead of thinking about
our emotion anger, we spend most of our time thinking about why we should be
angry (he cut me off in traffic, I held
the door open and she didn’t say a word, he didn’t return my call).
We fail to
question our beliefs regarding our behavior, so the internal conversation keeps
this emotion in place much longer than needed.
If you’re mindful enough to interpret this conversation (he might be late for work, she's late for an
important meeting, his phone isn’t charged), and simply witness the feeling
of anger as it arises, you’ll find that you can’t be mad for more than a few
moments at a time.
This is a
matter of turning consciousness on itself.
Eckhart
Tolle had an interesting thought regarding this phenomenon…
"It is liberating to realize that the
'voice in my head' is not who I am.’
“Who am I, then? The one who sees
that.”If you are sick and tired of your life…If you are at a point of readiness to change…If you are seeking the type of enlightenment that comes from the awareness of “who we are”, and “why we do what we do”….remember…it’s not about the trivial “doing a plan” or “doing meditation”. It’s much, much more than that. It’s about USING these tools to quiet the noise long enough to hear the internal dialogue of doubt, negativity, and frustration that has clearly defined and created the person we’ve become to be… and the reasons we do what we do.
~ Socrates
Saturday, January 2, 2016
Perhaps
“I cried because I had
no shoes until I saw a man with no feet”
Buddha
Sometimes, learning to consider alternative ways of viewing the events in our lives can be beneficial by reducing negative feelings and thoughts and learning to see the potential good, as well as the potential for a seemingly bad situation to not be all bad. This, of course, takes much practice, but is within everyone's reach. (We perceive…believe…emotions…behavior…consequences)
“Men are disturbed not by
things, but by the view which they take of them”
~ Epictetus
Long ago in
China there was an old farmer. With the same horse this old farmer had plowed
and worked his land for many years when one day his horse suddenly ran away. As
news of this reached his neighbors, the old farmer was met with sympathy.
Neighbors visited throughout the day saying, "Wow, what bad luck to have
your horse run away!"
The old
farmer would think for a moment then say softly, "Perhaps..."
The next
morning the old farmer awoke to find his horse had returned. With the horse
were several wild horses who had apparently followed the horse home. Neighbors
rejoiced, visiting the old farmer to express how happy they were for his sudden
good fortune.
The old
farmer would think for a moment then say softly, "Perhaps..."
Shortly
after, the old farmer's son decided to try to ride one of the wild horses.
Climbing on the horses back, the boy knocked the animal hard with his leg
shouting for the horse to go. Startled, and probably a little annoyed, the horse
flung the boy off its back. The old farmer's son broke his leg in the fall.
Again, neighbors came to offer their sympathies for the misfortune, "What
a horrible string of bad luck you're having!"
The old
farmer would think for a moment then say softly, "Perhaps..."The very next day, military officials came into the village with orders to draft young men into military service. As they went from home to home, rounding up young men, they made their way to the old farmer's house. Upon seeing the farmer's son with his broken leg they decided to move on, leaving the boy alone. Once again, neighbors came to share words of congratulations to the old farmer for the good fortune to have his son passed by.
And again,
the old farmer would think for a moment then say softly, "Perhaps..."
~
Epictetus
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