Day 10 and Choosing our attitude

Day 10 is all about how our attitude affects the outcomes of our lives.  It's also about the power of shifting perspective.

Shifting perspective is so powerful, it's probably the only thing you need in order to become a happy fully self actualized person.  I remember a story about a Tibetan monk being tortured by the Chinese whose greatest concern was that he would lose his sense of compassion for his captors.  What an intense perspective! 

For someone truly to be able to do that, and believe and live it, what else is necessary for happiness?  It goes to show the old saying you can make a hell out of heaven or a heaven out of hell is pretty accurate.

So you can chage your perspective in situations that you cannot control and that can help you accept them and even be happy.  What about situations you can control?

"Problems are opportunities" is the other mantra that is essentially a perspective shifter.  I can't help but think of all the obstacles I'm currently facing in my life and how a well executed perspective shift will help me or a poor choice will disempower me.  It's a reminder that the ball really is in my court and I do have complete and total responsibility for my life.  There's no way around it! :)

Finally, my favorite part of doing the chapter today came from the following realization.  Lately, I've been working through a lot of emotional events for myself.  I almost feel as if there is sometimes a tension between exploring your emotions and understanding them so that you can make peace with them as opposed to simply "deciding not to" or "deciding to choose your feelings" and shifting your perspective away.

I think what I forgot is that how you feel is how you feel, and what you do and how you act is an entirely different concern.  Emotions can be such a goldmine in the pursuit of reintegrating ourselves and understanding who we are.  Shutting them down or criticizing yourself for having them never leads to a well balanced person. 

I'm helped when I conjure up an image of a person who is a master at this.  I clearly see that individual feeling and understanding.  They accept who they are without judgment.   She is able to do all this work with her emotions, AND still choose her actions.  How you feel is how you feel, and how you act is always your decision.

I am definitely grateful for all these reminders.  I feel like they came at a good time.  Have a wonderful day everyone.

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