Tag: hope

  • Understand. Then accept. Then forgive.

    Understand. Then accept. Then forgive.

    I see so many who claim to have forgiven, but are still weighed down by what was done to them.

    There’s an important difference between forgiving as a means to forego punishing someone or demanding retribution, versus forgiving because you truly understand why someone behaved badly.

    When that understanding is lacking, it makes it impossible to accept what they did, because we’ll never be able to reconcile why they did it.

    Without understanding why, acceptance becomes superficial, and forgiveness becomes a token gesture.

    Forgive and forget is a great notion of noble intent that often lacks any true resolution or peace.

    If you want that forgiveness to carry with it the promise of peace beyond that experience, you must seek to understand, without judgement, why someone treated you badly, or committed a dastardly deed.

    It’s through that understanding that we’ll discover that their actions were more about their demons, than it was about how they felt about us.

    If our sense of significance or self-worth was defined by their validation of who we are, even understanding won’t give us that peace.

    But, that’s on us. Not on them. We’re responsible for how we feel about ourselves. And no amount of forgiveness will change that.

    It always starts with you.

  • The weight of life

    The weight of life

    How often do we judge others for being moody just because they’re easily annoyed at things that don’t go smoothly for them?

    How often do others judge us for the same thing?

    Moodiness is most often our way of communicating that we’re unhappy about repeatedly being taken for granted, when we’re tired of communicating that we’re tired of being taken for granted. Right?

    When we want to believe that someone cares, we won’t always tell them what we need, because then we’re never certain if they respond out of sincere care or obligation.

    That’s why we choose ‘moodiness’ to express our dissatisfaction about what’s troubling us, or what we’re not getting from them.

    Just don’t lose yourself to those moods.

    Sometimes people may be too distracted by their own pressures in life, and if you wait for them to notice that you’re unhappy, you may assume that they don’t care when in fact, they were simply distracted.

    If you care about them, you’ll find a way to get their attention without judging them to be insensitive or uncaring.

    It’s all about understanding.

    When we’re not getting what we need, it doesn’t mean that we should stop giving what we’ve got.

    It always starts with you.

  • Your world. Your worries.

    Your world. Your worries.

    I walked on the lawn with bare feet the other day.

    For a moment my senses were teased and I felt grounded.

    I gazed around the garden and looked past the sprouting indigenous trees, and instead noticed the chores left unfinished, or new ones that begged for my attention.

    I walked on and paid little attention to them because the lawn felt so good beneath my feet.

    In that moment I knew that even the reality of this world and all its worries could not rob me of the fascination of that moment.

    But no sooner had that thought occurred that I found myself robbing myself of that which the world was unable to take from me.

    That’s when I realised that I willingly give up that peace, or that moment of beauty, when I allow myself or others to contaminate it by worrying about that which I can’t change or influence in that very moment.

    The most common cause of such worry is self-pity, feverish self-pity is driven by our belief that no one cares enough to share our load, or consider our needs.

    Self-pity is driven by ingratitude.

    That ingratitude is not only for what others contribute, in their own way, towards our lives, but especially ingratitude for how much value we’re able to contribute towards others if we didn’t worry about getting credit for it.

    Focus on the value that you can create in the world around you, and your gratitude for who you are will create the peace in your heart that you’re so desperately in need of.

    It always starts with you.


  • Don’t test the ones you love. Love them.

    Don’t test the ones you love. Love them.

    Ever find that despite your best efforts, someone close to you just never appreciates what you do for them?

    Ever feel like you’re having to fulfil their expectations in detail about how to do something the way that they want you to do it before they are satisfied with you?

    Even then, when you do that thing exactly the way they wanted you to, they then question your sincerity.

    “You only did it because I asked you to!”

    Does that sound familiar?

    Damned if you do and damned if you don’t.

    The reason that they treat us that way, or even why we may treat others in that way is not because we’re questioning their sincerity, it’s because we doubt our significance to them.

    When we feel insignificant, we test others, often in passive aggressive ways, to see if we’re really important to them.

    The only reason we test them is because we don’t appreciate them. And then we hold them responsible for how we don’t appreciate ourselves either. That’s why we test them.

    When we look for kindness to be packaged in a specific way, we lose sight of the kindness or affection that they offer of their own accord, in their own way.

    When we expect others to express their appreciation, or affection towards us in a specific way, we not only diminish who they are, we also show ingratitude for their sincere efforts towards us.

    Then, when they pull away because they feel unappreciated, or taken for granted, or worse, because they feel invisible, we convince ourselves that we were right about their insincerity to begin with.

    Self-loathing is the root of most relationship problems.

    Don’t hold your partner or significant others responsible for how you feel about yourself.

    If you don’t appreciate who you are, you give others permission to take you for granted.

    It always starts with you.


  • The gift of who you are

    The gift of who you are

    It’s human to feel fatigued or despondent.

    But, it’s not human to give up.

    We’re wired to persevere. To overcome. To prevail. To improve what we have around us.

    When we feel oppressed in our efforts to achieve these ends, we either grow despondent, or we grow aggressive.

    Both those reactions are an indication that we’ve lost sight of the gift of who we are.

    When we feel burdened, we’re focused on whether our efforts will be appreciated, accepted, respected, or rejected, etc.

    That means that we’re more focused on being significant in that moment, or in that relationship, rather than connecting with the value of what brings us joy that we want others to experience with us.

    But, just like a gift, if we buy something for someone because we like it, without any concern about what they think of it, then we’re not really buying that gift for them, are we?

    Similarly, when we find joy in living life a certain way, or connecting with an experience in a certain way, and we want to share that with others, our focus must be on how do we connect them to that experience. Not on whether they appreciate our efforts or trust our opinion about why that experience is important.

    In other words, if your gift to someone is sincere, you don’t force them to like it. You put in the time and effort to understand what and how they would experience something they love, and try to gift it to them in that way. After all, it’s for them.

    We find joy in connecting with others in that way.

    The same must be true about offering the best of who you are to those around you.

    Of course, you need to first appreciate who you are before you’ll be able to connect others to that joy within you that you want them to experience with you.

    So, as always, the question is simple. Do you know yourself well enough to appreciate the gift that you hold within?

    It always starts with you.

  • Own your choices. Own your life.

    Own your choices. Own your life.

    Surely my sincere pursuit of happiness and enlightenment cannot be the cause of my own misery?

    Why didn’t someone make me aware of it?

    Why didn’t someone say something?

    Why couldn’t they just understand what I was going through?

    Even if all those questions are answered in the affirmative. it does not change the reality of the fact that it was choices, well-meaning but sometimes destructive choices that we made sincerely and with conviction that isolates the very blessing that we set out to acquire.

    We are not only accountable for the choices that we recognise.

    That is an easy accountability to accept.

    We are especially accountable for the choices that we don’t realise we’re making.

    It is accepting accountability for the choices that we did not intend to make that influences our authenticity and often, the quality of the relationships that contribute towards the joy and comfort that we experience in life.

    Neglect these out of fear of being accountable for causing harm or pain, and you will find yourself troubled by consequences that seemingly have no good reason to happen to a good person.

    And that, I believe, is one of the reasons why bad things happen to good people.

    But, don’t forget. If this is true for you, if it’s true for those around you as well.

    When we see others making decisions that may bring harm or offence to us, we need to consider the above in their favour.

    We’re all human.

    The more aware we are of our humanness, the more humane we’ll be towards others.

    It always starts with you.



  • Don’t trade your virtues for vices

    Don’t trade your virtues for vices

    Don’t withhold the beauty of your spirit just because there is no one around to appreciate it.

    Be who you are, and let others be who they choose to be.

    The expectation of being treated the way we treat others is what causes much bitterness and anger.

    It’s not worth it.

    Give without the expectation of receiving. And when you don’t receive, give some more.

    Waiting for others to return the favour before we do more, denies us the fulfilment of being who we are, while compromising our values to be who they are.

    Remember, we cannot give what we don’t have.

    When you withhold your gifts because you’re waiting for others to respond in kind first, you’re assuming that they have within them what drove you to give of yourself in the first place.

    It’s a crazy cycle.

    Break it by giving without the expectation of receiving from them in return.

    That’s the secret to fulfilment and contentment in our lives.

    When we expect something in return, we deny ourselves that fulfilment and we turn our good deeds into transactions.

    When we transact with our virtues in that way, not only do we diminish the value of what we’ve done and who we are, but we also end up treating others the way that they’ve treated us.

    That’s how we lose ourselves to our expectations from others.

    It always starts with you.

  • Faith is always there

    Faith is always there

    Faith is often associated with spirituality, or religion.

    But faith plays a role in our lives in ways we easily lose sight of.

    When we trust someone, we have faith in them to do the right thing.

    When we mistrust someone, we have reason to fear that they’ll do the wrong thing, meaning that we have more faith in them not doing the right thing.

    Faith is always at play the moment we consider what we need from the next moment, the next day, or the next encounter with someone about something important.

    If we lose sight of what we’re investing our faith in, we’ll focus on responding to our fear about the outcome potentially not being achieved, and our efforts will be driven towards mitigating the risk of that outcome.

    Our faith from a spirituality perspective is our fall back position for when our faith in others may be betrayed.

    But, if we only rely on our fall back position, we’ll prevent ourselves from having faith in those around us, giving them little reason to believe that we appreciate or trust them.

    That’s how we create distance between ourselves and others, and often, use that as a reason to believe that we were right in not trusting them.

    Meanwhile, they didn’t feel trusted. That’s why they created distance between them and us.

    Being true to yourself despite the risk of being disappointed when you invest your faith or time in others, is what becomes possible when you truly connect with the value of who you are, and what you are passionate about leaving as your legacy in the lives of those around you.

    When self-doubt creeps in, we withdraw our withhold or contribution, because we need others to validate our significance before we believe in ourselves.

    It always starts with you. Own your life.