Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.
M. Kathleen Casey
Life is overflowing with things to agonize over, but the amount of time spent willingly banging your poor head against an immovable object is your choice. Shit happens, people change, players use and abuse, parents fail, children screw up, friends prove false; the list of reasons to be melancholy seems endless. Giving into the negative emotions that any heartache inspires is all too easily accomplished by meekly following a thought pattern, as if you're a hostage. But remember that the bully inside isn't planning on driving you anywhere worth going; its agenda violently discourages any sort of independent travel, mostly by inspiring overwhelming fear or intense melancholy. All too quickly you become breathless under the weight of negative thoughts and emotions, making getting out of bed seem a trip of a million miles.
Too near the edge isn't a safe place to abandon yourself to the push of doom. Free-falling into disaster isn't any way to live, but some of us do it all the time. Things with the power to wound keep on doing so as long as we give them free rein. Learning then moving on puts the power where it belongs. Old hurts will only stay fresh if we constantly pick at them with our thoughts. It may be harder in the short term to wrestle the negative into silence, but it saves the long term for really living. Don't make the frog prince a king by renting him space in your mind. Don't let a less than perfect childhood keep doing damage your whole life long. Don't let a liar make you blind to truth, or a false love make you doubt a true one exists.
You can't live a pain free life, but your suffering is mind made after a certain point. What sense is it to let yourself bleed forever for something that someone else did to you, when all too quickly they'll hardly remember your name. I forgive myself for being human enough to be easily wounded, then I forgive the one who hurt me. I don't forget the pain or its source, but I do refuse to let anyone make me bitter or jaded toward life. With some forethought and a bit of luck one pain will help me avoid another. Hurt whenever you must, but suffer as little as possible.
THINK ABOUT IT... LET IT RIDE... THEN YOU DECIDE!!!
© GLENDA ALEXANDER
