Lessons to learn......

Have you ever heard someone say "Why does this always happen to me?"  Sure you have or maybe you have had the same thoughts.  There are times we experience the same or similar situation over and over again.  There is a reason this happens.  The universe (or God depending on your belief system) has a message for you.  There is a lesson to be learned from repetitive unfortunate events.  For example, you meet someone special in your life.  You try to do whatever you can to please that person, however you soon find you are being taken advantage of and eventually the relationship ends and you ask yourself 'why does this keep happening to me?', the lesson to be learned is you have to take care of you, because if you do not, who will?  Until you learn this lesson, the situation will repeat itself.  Another example could be finance related, perhaps you find yourself low on cash during the holidays and you do not understand why.  The reason is probably the fact you did not prepare for the holidays and now you feel like the universe is working against you when in reality you are working against youself.  Something else to think about, no matter what you believe in, ultimately it is your actions that shape the life you live.

Temporary Happiness

What is Temporary Happiness? Temporary Happiness is happiness derived from external means. Most of us live for temporary happiness. We plan events, get excited about the event, enjoy the event (usually not as much as we hoped) and then come down from the temporary happiness high. We continue to look for things to make us happy and we are happy for a while and then it is on to the next Happy High. This is ok if that is what works for you, however there is usually long periods of unhappiness or sadness or longing for 'better' times. It is during these 'down' periods we realize Temporary Happiness does not work. Happiness comes from within. When you have learned to accept yourself and the people around, than you can begin to experience true peace and happiness. True happiness starts and ends with you. When you depend on other people or things, you give those people or things power over your peace and happiness. You have to truly love yourself and accept the things you cannot change and change the things you can. Like any problem, once you realize the problem exists it is the first step to resolving it.

The ego

The ego is your other self, it is currently your prominent self.  Ego affects everything you do and everything you feel.  Accepting peace is difficult because the ego does not want peace, it wants problems, it wants something to sustain it.  How do you know when this happens?  This happens when you get sad or upset, the ego will add to the emotion with past mostly negative experiences.  For example, you fail a test and you are frustrated because you wanted to pass, the ego will bring up past failures and add them to the current experience and before you realize it, you think you are a complete failure because the ego has piled on several totally unrelated experiences.  I will let you ponder this post and my next post I will talk about temporary happiness.  Once you recognize the obstacles preventing peace, then we can work towards removing the obstacles and walking the path of peace.

Awareness

Awareness is a big step on the road to peace. Once you are aware of your actions and reactions, you should try to view your actions as an outside observer. You will notice there is a part of you that behaves without your conscious knowledge. This part of you is the ego. The ego is unconscious behavior. For example, think about how you feel when someone insults you, a loved one, or your favorite possession. The insult does not cause any physical harm, however you immediately, without thought, react to the perceived insult. You are ready to cause mental and physical harm because of the insult. The ego uses these unconscious actions or reactions to strengthen itself. The ego likes negative emotions more than positive ones. Negative emotions are easier to invoke. For example, if you play a sport and you play 10 games. If you win the first game, you feel great and the ego wants this feeling to continue. So you play three more games and if you lose all three, the ego will start down the negative path. If you lose two more games, the ego is thriving off of your negative view of yourself. You start calling yourself a failure and a loser. By the tenth game you are angry at everyone and everything involved. You lash out, you become hostile. At this point the ego is in full control. Once you are able to see the ego in action, you will see the road it takes you down and that road leads to temporary happiness and more often than not, no happiness at all. The road to peace means the death of the ego. To bring death to the ego, you should start observing it, do not fight it or give it energy. Let it pass and start accepting peace.

Here is a saying that helps: When something bothers you, let it pass like gas. It may stink but you will live through it.

What is my blog about.....

If you are reading this, then you are probably wondering what my blog is about.  I am a student of A New Earth, a book written by Echart Tolle.  Reading his book has allowed me to see a clear path to peace in my everyday life.  I decided to blog my thoughts and ideas and hopefully help myself and others accept peace in everyday life.  Weekly I will add a thought or lesson.  Thank you for taking the time to read my post.