Choices

“If you are standing upright, don’t worry if your shadow is crooked.” ~ Chinese proverb


The past two weeks I’ve been reading an awesome book, the title of which was the selection of our book club for this month. In the story, Jimmy is one of three friends who meet as children and find their lives strangely reconnected as they become adults. Compared to his friends, Jimmy had all the ingredients for a disastrous recipe – a drunken father, an emotionally detached mother, and a childhood spent in a rundown neighborhood amid crime and poverty.

When Jimmy meets his second wife – after his first wife dies of cancer – she asks him if it is true that living a life of crime is in his blood. Jimmy, wanting to make a good impression on her, but also quite honest in the way he feels, replies that a more prominent tendency to commit crimes might be part of his DNA, but it is up to him whether he will ever allow it to get out or not. Being solely responsible for his small child after the death of his wife, he is determined to live honestly and within the boundaries of the law.

When I read that part, I was stunned at the accuracy of the statement...Jimmy is completely right. Regardless of what’s handed to us at birth, or throughout part of our lives when we were not in a position to change circumstances, we are in charge of what will happen to us and to our loved ones from this moment on.

Certainly, if one has lived a horrible reality, it is understandable that they feel compelled to act a certain way, yet, they are still responsible for the choices they make in the present, and those they will make it in the future. While past legacies and past mistakes might explain the cause of a certain type of behavior, they still don’t excuse it.

At some point, one must choose if they will continue to abuse themselves and others using their past as a validation for their poor choices or if they will pick themselves up and decide that enough is enough.

The cards one is dealt are important, but the game still has to be played before anyone can be labeled a winner or a loser. We have no choice on the cards we get, but we do have control on how we will manage our hand.

The Dog and the Old Man

“The golden moments in the stream of life rush past us and we see nothing but sand; the angels come to visit us, and we only know them when they are gone.” ~George Elliot

I would like to share a story that my mother-in-law sent me a while back. The story is told by a young lady whose father struggles with personal anger after he can no longer work as a lumberjack because of health issues. After suffering a heart attack, he is invited to live with his daughter and her husband, but as days go by, tension begins to rise. The father is resentful of his declining health and lashes out at everyone.

The young woman prays for a resolution, but for months God is silent. Finally, she decides to call several clinics hoping to find some advice. During one of those calls, a friendly lady tells her about an article she has read about people with the same symptoms greatly benefiting from caring for a pet.

She drives to the local shelter to look for a dog, but none seem right for her father. Then, she spots a pointer in the last pen. Years have etched his face and muzzle with shades of gray; his hipbones jut out in lopsided triangles, but his eyes are calm and clear. She asks the attendant about the dog and is told that he just showed up near the shelter two weeks before.

When she gets home, she shows her father the dog she got for him, but he replies angrily that he doesn’t want a pet, and definitely not one so old and frail. Tension rises, and father and daughter face each other down as if preparing to duel. Just then, the dog walks up to the old man, sits in front of him, and raises his paw to touch the man’s leg. Time stands still. The old man continues to look at the dog who just sits there calmly, his paw still raised. He finally kneels down and takes the dog’s paw in his hand. From that day on they are inseparable. Within the course of a few months, all the anger, frustration and tension wash away, as the old man and his dog become more closely connected.

One night, the dog walks into the young lady’s room, whimpering. Considering the fact quite strange, she rushes to her father’s room. She finds him in his bed, his face peacefully relaxed and at ease in his final sleep. The dog raises his paw and touches him for one last time.

It’s not until the dog has passed away - and she reminisces about her father’s last few months - that the young lady realizes something important. She had prayed for her father to find peace, and had thought her prayers had gone unanswered. Yet they hadn’t. The girl on the phone and the dog were angels she hadn’t recognized. At the time, everything had seemed coincidental but none of it was – the woman, the article, and the dog that had mysteriously appeared at the shelter out of nowhere.

Prayers often seem to go unanswered because they don’t manifest as we imagined. We expect a result which will pacify our wants, because we are not aware of our true needs.

Sometimes the path to our greater good is an uncharted one, yet if we follow it with faith it will lead us where we need to go.

Two Sides to One Coin (repost)

A few years ago I ran into a book I normally would not have considered reading. It was a biography of sorts, describing the life of a Holy man. What I thought was going to be a very boring read turned out to be a very illuminating work, which really gave me chewable food for thought.

In one of the chapters, the Holy man was visited, one day, by the town drunk; as everyone expected – being the infamous derelict that he was – the man walked in showing no respect, and began his verbal lashing in a very loud fashion. After spewing hateful words, and displaying an unwarranted angry behavior, the drunken man was about to turn on his heels and leave again. The Holy man smiled, thanked him for coming and told him to come back any time. At this juncture, all the believers in the room were puzzled, and asked the Holy man if he knew who the hateful fellow was. The Holy man only smiled, then whispered softly: “Yes, he is the most loving man I’ve ever met. He just hasn’t met that part of himself yet.”

Needless to say, this chapter had me thinking for days. Was the Holy man delusional? Was he so enshrouded in the light of Spirit that he couldn’t tell the difference between a spiritual being and a heavenly reject? Or was the Holy man so wise in his assessment that he could see something that was obviously eluding me?

I started watching angry people with different eyes, hoping to get a clear picture of what the wise man was talking about. What I saw the next several months knocked my socks off. Most of the angry people out there really were only lost to themselves, roaming around unhappily and hoping to connect somehow.

Anger is an emotion. To trigger anger one must be open to feelings. Most angry people are simply very sensitive people who are afraid and put up an intimidating shield to stop people from getting too close. Someone told me once that if you can feel one emotion you are already familiar with its opposite - the twin, the other side of the coin. The two are at odds with each other, and always present at the same time; if one can be triggered, so can the other.

I began to test the waters anytime I met anyone who appeared angry and despondent. I would argue with them a little, just to trigger the one side of emotions they were most comfortable and familiar with; once they became angry, I would switch my response and expose them to the twin feeling while they were riding the peak of the opposite wave. The results were astounding. Fire cannot be put out with more fire, but only with its opposite. Opposites defuse and neutralize one another, creating a new stage of play.

And for those who wonder whatever happened to the drunken man in the book, he went back to see the Holy man several times; with each visit, his anger diminished a bit more and he was able to open up and listen, rather than lash out at every word the teacher uttered. Soon, he became his most faithful follower, and remained with the Holy man until his teacher’s death many years later.