To thine own self be true.
And it must follow as the night the day,
thou canst not then be false to any man.
~Shakespeare
What is the opposite of fear? Happiness, joy, love? What is it to be fear-less? I believe it is Gratitude. That overwhelming sense that everything, every person, every experience in your life is a gift. I recently encountered this meaning, this knowledge of Gratitude in my life when I told Fear to take a hike. It is a path that I have found to be so revealing, so honest. It feels like someone took a knife and cut me open, freeing me, and underneath was an emotional depth that I didn't know existed before. I stopped comparing myself to others, to what I thought I "should" be. I forgave the past and stopped concerning myself with the future. I am so unhappy when I think about the future. That probably sounds strange, I know. When I obsess about the future, I feel like I am peddling up a hill with no end in sight. I realized that the only thing the future needs is for me to live today, me here living in the now. The only way I knew to do that was to be grateful for the day, grateful for my health, for my body, for my mind, for my time, and my gifts.
I am not a religious person, and I don't think you need to be in order to understand the meaning of gratitude for your life. I do, however, believe that the Christian story of God sacrificing his only begotten son so that we may have eternal life rests entirely on the concept of gratitude. Whether or not the story of Jesus is literal fact is meaningless to me, because what I understand in the story is that the gift is in the sacrifice made, a sacrifice given to show us the meaning of gratitude. I say this knowing that I love facts, I love digging through the superfluous crap and finding the "truth," finding the facts. And I suppose I have contradicted myself by not needing to believe in the literal story of Jesus, as written in the Bible, to understand the meaning. The meaning doesn't rest in facts, and not only that, but the meaning might be different for each person. Yeah, try living in my brain for a day : ).
Back to gratitude....Today, I am grateful for my questioning mind (see above). Without it, I would never dig to learn more. I am grateful for my vulnerability and uncertainty. I am grateful that I will never know all the answers because it is that lack of certainty that makes my life an adventure. I am grateful that the only thing I am certain of is that my love will live on after I have perished, and that true wealth lies in the gratitude for my life.
What is the opposite of fear? Happiness, joy, love? What is it to be fear-less? I believe it is Gratitude. That overwhelming sense that everything, every person, every experience in your life is a gift. I recently encountered this meaning, this knowledge of Gratitude in my life when I told Fear to take a hike. It is a path that I have found to be so revealing, so honest. It feels like someone took a knife and cut me open, freeing me, and underneath was an emotional depth that I didn't know existed before. I stopped comparing myself to others, to what I thought I "should" be. I forgave the past and stopped concerning myself with the future. I am so unhappy when I think about the future. That probably sounds strange, I know. When I obsess about the future, I feel like I am peddling up a hill with no end in sight. I realized that the only thing the future needs is for me to live today, me here living in the now. The only way I knew to do that was to be grateful for the day, grateful for my health, for my body, for my mind, for my time, and my gifts.
I am not a religious person, and I don't think you need to be in order to understand the meaning of gratitude for your life. I do, however, believe that the Christian story of God sacrificing his only begotten son so that we may have eternal life rests entirely on the concept of gratitude. Whether or not the story of Jesus is literal fact is meaningless to me, because what I understand in the story is that the gift is in the sacrifice made, a sacrifice given to show us the meaning of gratitude. I say this knowing that I love facts, I love digging through the superfluous crap and finding the "truth," finding the facts. And I suppose I have contradicted myself by not needing to believe in the literal story of Jesus, as written in the Bible, to understand the meaning. The meaning doesn't rest in facts, and not only that, but the meaning might be different for each person. Yeah, try living in my brain for a day : ).
Back to gratitude....Today, I am grateful for my questioning mind (see above). Without it, I would never dig to learn more. I am grateful for my vulnerability and uncertainty. I am grateful that I will never know all the answers because it is that lack of certainty that makes my life an adventure. I am grateful that the only thing I am certain of is that my love will live on after I have perished, and that true wealth lies in the gratitude for my life.
2 comments:
I like what you are saying. Though I got lost in the second paragraph with your uses of Fact, meaning, meaningless, and truth.
Yeah, like I would even try to live in your head one day... This scorpio knows better.... Let me go find a rock to sit on and watch the gemini go around and around and around:)
Ouch! Well I am so sorry you can't keep up. The scorpio might have a sting, but it is so sssllloooowwww. Keep up, read between the lines. Think beyond the words. Goodness do I have to spell it out for ya?
It's called internal dialogue. The dual gemini often has conversations with itself. What? Shhhh. What did you say? Yes he is so, ya know...
Sorry that was my other self telling me you are boring me! :)
Now I must go skip off into the sunset....lalalala
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