No-one would deny that life can deal some tricky hands to manage.
What I'm realising increasingly is the importance of MY response to these twists and turns.
For most of my life I would say I’ve defaulted with no awareness of this to a “rollercoaster” mentality. Ie Just going with my instinctive (learnt for better or worse) responses and hence just hang on to the ride and wait/hope for the better times.
What I’m working on is driving the God given all terrain vehicle that is my amazing and hugely powerful & influential mind and thoughts. The external world I can change only in limited quantities…but my reaction to it – now that’s a different matter. Nobodies saying deny reality and stick your head in the sand. But there’s often at very least two ways of looking at things. And often I’ve seen how the “default setting” doesn’t actually help a great deal and worse - can be destructive in itself. For example, let’s say I haven’t heard from my wife whose been gone in town and missed meal time. It’s dark and raining and her mobile’s off. Hmm…I can default to panic, worry and stress (oh believe me I could!!) and go off frantically driving the streets… or I can choose to remain calm and add in a little level headed judgement which – as I think more objectively based on the facts (& not the feelings) tells me that they’re more than likely fine and will probably be back any second or I’ll get a call to pick them up. Obviously there comes a point when the ol’ “fight or flight” response is entirely appropriate but half the time I can trigger it off over things that really don’t warrant it. I’m learning to ditch the coaster and drive the 4x4…oh - and the family was fine!
What I'm realising increasingly is the importance of MY response to these twists and turns.
For most of my life I would say I’ve defaulted with no awareness of this to a “rollercoaster” mentality. Ie Just going with my instinctive (learnt for better or worse) responses and hence just hang on to the ride and wait/hope for the better times.
What I’m working on is driving the God given all terrain vehicle that is my amazing and hugely powerful & influential mind and thoughts. The external world I can change only in limited quantities…but my reaction to it – now that’s a different matter. Nobodies saying deny reality and stick your head in the sand. But there’s often at very least two ways of looking at things. And often I’ve seen how the “default setting” doesn’t actually help a great deal and worse - can be destructive in itself. For example, let’s say I haven’t heard from my wife whose been gone in town and missed meal time. It’s dark and raining and her mobile’s off. Hmm…I can default to panic, worry and stress (oh believe me I could!!) and go off frantically driving the streets… or I can choose to remain calm and add in a little level headed judgement which – as I think more objectively based on the facts (& not the feelings) tells me that they’re more than likely fine and will probably be back any second or I’ll get a call to pick them up. Obviously there comes a point when the ol’ “fight or flight” response is entirely appropriate but half the time I can trigger it off over things that really don’t warrant it. I’m learning to ditch the coaster and drive the 4x4…oh - and the family was fine!
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