In the past 2 months I have been really committed to growing, personally and emotionally and in a positive way. I have a thought of the day sent to my inbox, I find one positive thing about my day when it comes to a close and I write it down and if my thoughts start going to places they don't need to, I am trying to redirect them.
The redirection of thoughts is the hardest thing. It is so sad that the norm is to just get pissed off if something isn't going your way. A lot of people, including myself, don't take the time to breathe and examine the moment. No instead they shoot from the hip and sometimes damage the people around them with those bullets. I have been an observer of someone losing their ever loving mind at a customer service clerk, barely out of her teens because something wasn't "their way." I can only imagine the damage done to that poor girl's self. And yes, I have been guilty of it too, however my shooting from the hip has usually been done at the people who are not strangers in my life and I have directed my bullets at people I love.
So back to redirecting thoughts for a moment. Like I said, it is hard. It isn't comfortable because it isn't my norm. My norm has been to over-react and examine it later. So now I am forcing myself to identify that feeling I get before I feel like I am going to lose it and stop the thoughts. I am getting "better" at it because I have been committed to doing it for more than 2 months now. It is now becoming a habit and part of who I am. Oh I still have the occasional moment but even knowing that I am committed to trying makes it seem a lot easier to do (if that makes sense???).
Another worthy redirection - people who don't like me and worse, people who don't even know me and don't like me. I really used to be offended and really hurt when people didn't like me. I HAD to figure out why and then fix it. I think back now to the times I did that and what a waste it was. One of these times involved a person's family member who I had never even met and judgement was passed based on something someone else had said. I spent a lot of energy thinking on how I could fix that situation and let them see me for who I am. Then I realized, if I had gone through life and had never met that person would it have mattered? No, it wouldn't. I hadn't known that person before and my life was what it was. I was who I was - I am who I am - NOTHING was changed by how this person felt about me.
I am not responsible for how those people feel, especially the ones who really haven't taken the time to get to know me and have just taken the words of another as truth. I know who I am as a person. I know what I have to give. I am not perfect. I struggle with life like all the other millions of people on this planet. Some days I love myself more than other days, but I like me and when it comes down to it - me liking me is what really matters.
Do I have regrets - sure I do, but I am learning now to recognize regrets as learning experiences. I have never walked away from a regret without a lesson - I just don't always see the lesson in the moment (see redirection of thought works in a lot of places!!)
I am a work in progress but I am progressing in the direction that I need to be going. Not everyone likes that, and not everyone needs to. In the words of one of my favourite quotes "If you want something you've never had, you must be will to do something you've never done." - Thomas Jefferson
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