Wordplay

Heard something yesterday that kind of tickled my fancy (HA) and made me stop and think.

We should stop asking how we can get out of a challenging situation and instead ask what we can get out of the experience.

So concisely put but so true -- I think, regardless of whether the medium is religion, psychology or a blurry mix of the two, this truth, when delivered, has such a sobering effect. This is taking a given set of circumstances and understanding that nothing that has taken place is positive or negative; only our minds make it so. The concept of a person with "bad luck" versus someone who seems to have been born into good fortune -- that's all perception.

In navigating my way (both literally and figuratively) through New York City, I see that part of the reason why people can burn out here so quickly is that they fail to see the big picture, the impermanence of their situations. Stressful though a project at work may be, it too shall pass. Time waits for no one, and therefore, it's silly to assume that a bad situation will continue to be bad. The truth is, a bad situation stops being bad the instant you decide it's not. It's really that simple, and really that complicated.

Having a constructive attitude is something that I'm working on. The most valuable resource we have is (perhaps second to time) our psychic energy, and where we focus that really does determine how our days, weeks, years, and eventually, lives, turn out. Expanding focus is something like growing a plant, though. Leave it untouched and untended, and it becomes just a pile of dirt and rubble concealing a few kernels of potential.

Pretty unfortunate, ya know what I mean?