Some thoughts came through after reading a quote by Victor E. Frankl; “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” Yes! The difference between a reaction and a response is breathing. Reaction is ingrained emotional, mental, patterned, and triggered. Response is heart centered and calm and has an intuitive awareness.
When you see the hook dangling in front of you wanting to push your buttons or triggers it’s the ability to recognize and taking three slow breaths that enables you to heart-center and process. If you react then you’re already hooked and willingly participating in a pattern that doesn’t serve you. When you re-act then you are acting again (behaving from ingrained pattern usually since childhood) in the same way to the same thing of a different color. With practice, recognition, and awakening awareness you can then decide if it warrants a response or maybe it’s just their own stuff being thrown at you. It takes constant practice and doesn’t always pull through. It’s recognizing the intuitive flags that come up from your heart space in lieu of the fear worries that distort the truth of the present moment.
When I get hooked, which I still do but much less, I’m able to recognize and release quicker but not always before taking a bite. Life is so interesting and it’s good to remember that our emotional adult selves are reacting from our unresolved or unacknowledged childhood fears, pain, sadness, and traumas and no one is exempt. Suffering is a part of being human but it does not mean we have to always suffer. We can shift it. It takes dedication and willingness to look directly at your shadows.
The interesting thing for me is that my fear of my pains and fear of them never ending once I open to them is much worse than the never ending pain sadness and suffering I had endured for decades. I was so emotionally broken a couple of years ago that I decided that one or two years of dedication towards healing and changing that which does not serve would much better than continuing to survive life with all my bags. I can assure you that you will come out of the darkness and your world will feel lighter and worryless.
And finally; it’s good to consider the source; if a schmuck calls you an idiot, how much weight does it have? Your mind was not created to eclipse your heart’s wisdom. Start where you are by tuning in and watching your windy mind. “You are the sky and everything else is just the weather.” As my friend Charlie once told me “no feeling is good or bad or right or wrong and if you find that it doesn’t serve you anymore then maybe you will make a shift, or maybe you won’t.” What I share is my experience and learning and perhaps it will resonate with you, or not. Enjoy now because it’s already gone, this is always a choice.
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