Clarity is … easier
My Tuesday’s have turned into the craziest, busiest days of the week. I completely forgot that yesterday was Tuesday! It was, in my brain, Monday. Not everyone has a M-F 9-5. As a matter of fact, there are millions of people in our world that don’t even think in that 40-hour-a-week mindset. They can’t even relate to our work/life-by-the-clock mentality.
This is an opportunity to learn about other cultures. Writing for a global audience gives me the invitation to become aware of how someone in another country would interpret what I’m talking about. It made me consider beginning each ‘Clarity is’ entry with, “In my country…”. It would be easier to express my feelings by acknowledging that not everyone will understand it.
This is how we break down the language of exclusion. Acknowledging with inclusive language.
‘Anxiety’ … for example
Anxiety for one culture is completely different for another. For example, several years ago, my personal life took a big hit. Disaster struck me and my family. Things snowballed into a couple of extremely difficult years. I began to suffer from PTSD as a result. I’v mended (for the most part) now. I knew I was living in an unreal reality, but I decided to become one with my pain, lean into the hard times, and embrace the negatives as a gift. Panic, anxiety and shame would have washed everything else down the drain if I had missed a weekly blog post two years ago. Something that is simply done as part of life in other cultures.
One day, I realized that nobody was harder on me than I was on myself. A gift that keeps on giving … pain.
Here in the USA, we don’t often turn pain into a gift of knowledge while learning the harder life lessons.
In that battle of flight or fight, ‘fight’ can mean a lot of things. Internal, mental, emotional fight is as real a manifestation of sorrow, as a physical fight. It’s a journey through the mind. Something that must be felt, more than studied in a sterile laboratory.
Embracing forgiveness
It gets easier with time. This, life lesson of sorrow. When we add loving kindness toward ourselves in times of internal struggle, we learn that though we may win the ‘fight’, we’re going to have scars. Battle scars of having won a hard fight.
It became easier to see clearly when I rationalized my struggle with the struggles of others living much harder lives. Loving kindness emerged the victor. I also realized that in the battle of ‘fight’ or ‘flight’, it’s not either/or. It’s a bit of both. People around the world will understand this universal truth.
The thing is, people who’ve seen hard times (and live to tell about it), are usually kinder, more tolerant, more compassionate, clearly aware individuals who ultimately understand that thriving and love are synonymous. Life isn’t about being perfect. It’s about savoring it perfectly. Then everything else is just … easier. Something I’ve borrowed from my international community. The ease of letting go.
Karen
About the Author: Karen Henry Daly is a positive psychology practitioner, blogger, author and speaker. She is a coach/consultant who writes both fiction and non-fiction about loving one’s best life, thriving, recovery and post traumatic thriving. Box 586 “Creating the life we want to live.”
“We Are The Positive Psychology People”.