No Excuses

“There’s right and there’s wrong. You got to do one or the other. You do the one, and you’re living. You do the other, and you may be walking around but you’re dead as a beaver hat.”
—Marion “John” Wayne

We have many opportunities in life to do the right thing or to do what we know is wrong. When we choose to do something that we know we should not do there are usually ways we can justify our actions.

Excuses and blame are easy to think of such as: I didn’t mean to; it just happened; it was her fault; I was just living in the moment; it was the alcohol; I didn’t plan it this way; and so on. And while there are times that we do things that we know we shouldn’t there is always the opportunity to stop moving forward with our mistake.

Just because we don’t see consequences of bad behavior today, it doesn’t mean there won’t be any or that when there are consequences we will know about them. Any time we are involved in behavior that could harm another person we need to step back and stop what we are doing.

Life offers us many temptations. We may feel justified in doing wrong because we are lonely, depressed, poor, or otherwise downtrodden. But doing wrong has no real excuses, at least not the kinds that absolve us of guilt.

Walking down the path of wrong will never bring us long-term fulfillment or happiness. It probably will cause us harm and hurt others too. It is our decision to do right or wrong, but excuses to justify do little if anything to right a wrong.

You can decide at any moment to stop a wrongdoing in process.

Getting Off the Roller-Coaster Ride

“Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance, order, rhythm and harmony.”
—Thomas Merton

Most of us say we want to have peace in our lives. We want peace and joy, but we don’t act like it. Instead we live our lives as if we are on a roller-coaster vacillating between the highs and lows and feeling as if something is wrong when we do find that we are in a place of peace.

When we are in the midst of feeling a lot of joy we know that it won’t last forever so when change comes, and it always does, we don’t need to be distraught and get depressed. Just like when we are down and out about something we must remember that this too shall pass and something will come along to bring us joy.

When we get off the roller-coaster ride that many of us have spent a great portion of our lives on, we may not find peace to be a place of comfort. We may think something is wrong with us because we just don’t feel too much of anything. However, not to worry, because more than likely if we’re active and living a full life but not having all the highs and lows that we have grown accustomed to we probably have found peace.

When life if full of intensity and stress it’s usually full of anger and pain. Living a life on the edge may be fun at times, the highs are great, but the lows are not so much fun. A more level-headed lifestyle can bring just as much happiness without falling into the depth of despair when we fall off the high.

Balance, peace, and harmony may not feel very exciting, but they are the best places to be.

Enabling Others

“A person who is acting out self destructively has no reason to change if they do not ever suffer major consequences for their behavior. If they are rescued from consequences, they are enabled to continue practicing their addiction.”
—Robert Burney

Enabling is often referred to as behaviors that rescue and allow alcoholics and addicts to continue their behavior without suffering the consequences. But beyond that it also relates to rescuing those who are involved in other self-destructive behaviors such as: gambling, eating disorders, the inability to keep a job, relationship addictions or having affairs, and anything else that is destructive to a person.

I’ve had experience as a full-fledged enabler of an alcoholic having lived with one for several years. It seemed at the time the best route was to let this person drink and just pick up the pieces as they fell. I took care of things to avoid problems and even called every day to ensure they would not be late for work. But with time my self-esteem was crushed and I suffered from depression and had to leave. Enabling did not save the relationship. It just delayed the loss of the relationship a few years.

We really don’t do anybody any favors when we enable an addiction or any unhealthy behavior. If we allow a bigot or male chauvinist to constantly trash talk whoever they have issues against, we are enabling. Someone who is a bigot is probably not going to change just because we tell them not to say things around us, but at least our side of the street is clean on the issue.

We are not in charge of other people’s lives. It is not always our place to voice our concerns over another’s behavior. However, it is our issue when we are in the presence of someone, or in a relationship with someone, who is carrying out actions for which we don’t approve. To say nothing is enabling. Whether or not they heed our warning is their issue, but it’s also in our best interest to walk away if the behavior does not change. We ought to not hang around for the rescue when their world comes crashing down. If we do then we are just as much a part of the wrongdoing as they are.

Enabling hurts you when you do it as well as the one you think you are helping.

Feeling Anger

“It’s okay for me to be angry today. It’s growful, if I use it for good.”
—Unknown

Feeling anger, just like every other emotion, is how we move through and past it. We can no more push anger down and hide it and then expect to be okay than we can just snap out of depression.

Anger can be a catalyst for change. When we feel anger it is a signal that things are not as they need to be for us. Sometimes we can do something about the cause of our anger, and at other times we can simply walk away from the cause of it.

When we do nothing about our anger it can be turned inward and thus affect our lives in a negative way. It affects our behaviors and carries from the thing that caused us anger to the person or situation that did not cause it. How we deal with anger is important.

When we are angry with another person the best thing we can do is be direct and tell them why we are angry. What we don’t want to do is curse at them or call them names. Most people will allow us to be angry, but they will not listen to us when we treat them with disrespect.

If someone does us wrong, the conflict will be resolved much easier the sooner we deal with it. Usually if we let things build up it will make us angrier and when we are direct about our anger sooner things are easier to resolve.

When we encounter anger and it’s an issue that we have no resolution for, we must find an outlet for that anger through exercise or some way that doesn’t hurt others. There is not always resolution for conflict, especially if the other person has power over us at work or in some other situation.

Taking care of ourselves includes feeling and releasing our anger. It’s okay to be angry, it’s just wise to use it in a way that helps us and not hurts us.

Anger may not be the most wonderful feeling, but it needs to be felt and dealt with for healthy well-being.

Rescue Yourself

“Stop waiting to be rescued. Rescue yourself.”
—Bobbi Kahler

Waiting to be rescued can become a habit for many. Some people have no idea how to take care of self so they always know that there’s a safety net to pick up the pieces (the bills, the depression, neediness, etc.).

There are those who believe that eventually the perfect person will come along and rescue them from the mess of a life they have woven. But the reality is there is not someone out there just waiting to rescue us.

These people tend to go from one relationship to another for fear of being alone. They are so desperate to be with another they latch on to someone, often before they finish with the one before. Carrying baggage from one relationship into another without taking time to heal is never a good idea.

Instead of dreaming of prince charming or princess compassion, we need to learn first to take care of ourselves. Thinking that having the perfect someone in our lives will suddenly make us live happily ever after is a pipe dream.

At times in our lives we must take risks, it is part of how we move forward and grow. However, we need to be there for ourselves if we fail. It’s always okay to garner support from friends and family, but if we continue to do things that are not healthy we cannot expect people to be there forever to listen to us yet again.

Loved ones are not there to rescue us. They are there to love us and support us and to help us grow and learn. When we learn to live our lives in a healthy way, when we love ourselves enough, we won’t get in positions requiring rescues.

Learn to love yourself and you will not need to be rescued.

Being True to Your Self

“You can be pleased with nothing when you are not pleased with yourself.”
—Mary Wortley Montagu

Being true to our self may be one of the most difficult things we do. There seems to be so many demands on us from family, work, volunteerism, church, and all of the many relationships we have.

With all of the things and people we have in our lives there are many and various pulls; things that one person may want that contrasts what someone else wants us to be or do, and most importantly demands that go against our core values.

Being true to self means that sometimes we have to say what others don’t want to hear. It means we have to stop people pleasing. We cannot be true to our self and always give others what they want. Sometimes being true to our self means that we can no longer be in relationships that cause us too much strain against who we are and what we believe.

If we simply do something or stay in a relationship to please the other person it’s doomed in the long run anyway. It will also erode our self-image if we continually go against what we need to do and give in to the demands of others.

Being true to our self is one way we get to know who we are. We clearly can’t define who we are when we are constantly answering to others despite what we want to do and what is right. If others cannot understand our values and insist that we live theirs, we don’t have to mold our self into who they want us to be.

If we look at ourselves honestly and find that we have some defects of character, we can overcome those. This is not to advocate being who we are when that’s not a good thing. Instead it’s about loving our self and doing the things we know to be right. It’s also about having the ability to say no when that is needed. It is about following our own path and not that of someone else, or one that is chosen for us by some other person.

Follow what you know is right for you and own your mistakes as well as your successes.

Good Energy

“Our mental and emotional diets determine our overall energy levels, health and well-being more than we realize. Every thought and feeling, no matter how big or small, impacts our inner energy reserves.”
—Doc Childre

Who we spend time with, how we use our time, and what we think about are what affects a great portion of our lives. If we control others or let them control us we suffer. When we spend time with people who have negative outlooks or gossip constantly, we’ll walk away from each encounter feeling down and icky.

We can spend time on positive things: reading uplifting books, helping others, meditating, praying, or exercising. In doing these things we will not only have more energy, but we’ll feel better mentally and physically.

Stress and negativity bring us down and zap our energy. Just recall when you’ve spent time with someone whose life is full of drama, or someone who talks bad about everyone they can think of. How do you feel when you walk away from that? Then think about times when you’ve been around someone who is full of joy, or think of a time when you did volunteer work. You most likely walked away from those interactions with a smile on your face and a song in your heart.

We can choose who we spend time with in our free moments. And in those times when we are close to negativity because of work or some other obligation, we can choose how much of that to take on us and with us.

When given a choice to involve our time in negative or positive thoughts and energy, choosing the positive will go a long way in keeping us healthy mentally, physically, and emotionally.

Take the high road when given a choice and you will find life easier and lighter.