Notes From The Awareness: 260

The more we accept, the happier we are.

Please discuss. How does this play out in life?

I’ll start us out. There are scenarios large and small that we find difficult to tolerate. Bigger scale ones—prejudice, verbal or physical abuse, flagrant unfairness—may require us to take action to alleviate the problem or remove ourselves from the situation. It feels wrong for us to allow that type of interaction to continue.

Then there are a raft of smaller scale events and exchanges that don’t quite sit right with us. We feel dismayed, puzzled, or resentful about another’s behavior. We may try to set the situation aside and pretend it didn’t happen, hoping to simply move past it. Yet somehow the negative emotions linger, coloring our moods.

Today’s message comes to me courtesy of my passed Russian Blue cat Jasper. He was a sweet, wise, sensitive, and essentially happy soul, even when circumstances might appear to be less than optimal. His message reminds me that it is okay if I don’t always initially like or approve of something that happens. Unless it is a high impact issue that I feel I absolutely must counter, I will want to acknowledge that the undesired event occurred, accept if fully, and then shift my focus elsewhere.

When I accept the episode, I release emotions like resentment that might otherwise subtly poison my perception of everything else. No longer bound by the resistance of my negative emotions, I’m freer to enjoy every other aspect of my life.

How about you? How do you let go of negative interactions?

Jasper