Little Things

Little things can make a huge difference to how we perceive the quality of our lives. Of course, there are also big events in our lives, but it’s the accumulation of effects from little things that makes a big difference to our resilience. A series of ‘good’ things (added, of course, to some sunny weather) can make us feel joyful and positive. A series of even minor ‘complications’ can have the reverse effect.

Empathy

When people talk about ’empathy’, they generally mean “Think like me; share my certainties, my desires and my limitations.” They look for allies to shape the world as they would shape it. But real empathy is much more than that.

Warrior

There are – essentially – just three ways in which to approach the world: to approach life. One can be a Slave, reacting to whatever life throws at one; having desires, but only having them fulfilled by ‘good fortune’. One can be a Warrior, choosing to ‘create’ that which one desires. Or one can be a Saint, needing nothing but what the world already provides. But to become a Saint, one must first cease to be a Slave. One must ‘be’ a Warrior, to learn about desire and to vanquish it.

Justified

The biggest difficulty that any of us faces with respect to negative emotions is that we ‘know’ that those feelings are justified. We are ‘right’ to feel negative, because it’s obvious that we really are being threatened or wronged. Because of this, we do nothing to curb the negativity … Indeed, we go out of our way to obtain redress: to remove the cause. And yet, this perception that we are justified is not a truth.