Stuff
happens. The car broke down and it will cost $900 to fix. The wind just blew the
fence over and you were hoping it might stay up just a little while longer. That
deal was for sure and for certain yesterday, and today they are completely off
the radar. You're behind on some things and the phone is ringing with 800
numbers. The work is piling up and it feels like you can't breathe. You just
want make the world go away and get it off your shoulders; to escape and find
solace in some secluded space with lots of nature and no cares. Things are
coming in groups and they just keep on coming.
Does any
of that ever happen to you? My list is a good deal longer, or at least that's
the way it seems sometimes. I want to think pleasant thoughts and I know they're
in there somewhere. Heck, I was just using them last week as I spoke to the
group about how well things were going. It must be the shadow over me that is
hiding them. How did I get myself into this fix anyway?
After
this much life and living, I'm convinced that these frustration-causers are
always coming through trying to mess things up. I think I should be able to deal
with them better than I do, but they are always changing and feel as if they are
mostly out of my control. Sometimes I even feel powerlessness. I used to think
that if I just thought positively, the negative things would leave, but that
isn't how it really works.
What
I've learned most recently--and this is what works--is that I can turn my
frustration into fascination, but not only that, actually doing that is a great
deal of the power in the change to get on to better things.
Escape
isn't the answer. Alcohol, drugs, sleep, food, none of that helps but for very
short spurts and always have baggage to drag along. Positive thinking isn't it
either. Pretending it isn't there, that these things are not happening won't
help at all.
The
only thing that I've found that really works is to turn frustration into
fascination and here is how I've learned to do that:
1.
Accept the things that are happening, the current life situation in all its
glory. Don't sugar coat it, try to change it, wish it were different, but just
accept it for face value. It is what it is.
2.
Focus on right now. This moment. Don't start the what if and when that happens,
this will happen and so on. Stay the heck out of the non-existent future. Stay
turned to right now. Almost all the problems are in the future and most of them
are just projections of what could happen or might happen.
3.
Treat what has happened or is happening as if you created it on purpose. I know
you didn't bring it on yourself. Who would do that? Stop blaming anything else
or anyone else. If at first you cannot find a way to accept it as your own
creation, then this will be the time to pretend. Pretend you created it on
purpose. There is such power in looking at your problems this way.
4.
Realize there is always a benefit. As you accept what is, focus on now, and
treat it as if you created it on purpose, it is pretty much a given that you
will begin to find that there are indeed some benefits to this thing or these
things. If not, play the game, what if. What if there were some benefits to this
thing that has happened. What might some of them be?
5.
Act when you feel compelled to act after steps one through four. Some things may
go away on their own, others will require some kind of action, dealing with,
etc. When you're clear what it is that you can do, then act.
6.
Last is to not take things and even life too seriously because it won't help a
bit. Not even a smidgen.
Frustration
is wanting things to be different than they are, or wanting you to be different
than you are, others to be different than they are, and so on. By accepting
things as they are, staying out of the past and future, looking on things as if
you created them on purpose, honoring the benefits that are absolutely there,
and acting on things that you can with what you have and where you are, along
with being light-hearted, you cannot help but be fascinated.
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