“Choose your battles wisely. After all, life isn’t measured by how many times you stood up to fight. It’s not winning battles that makes you happy, but it’s how many times you turned away and chose to look into a better direction. Life is too short to spend it on warring. Fight only the most, most, most important ones, let the rest go.”- C. JoyBell C.
Aries picks her battles wisely and tries for peaceful settlements rather than the gore of simply battling for battling’s sake. She was the justice-seeker. We all get angry. Anger is as much a gift as any emotion. It is what we do with that anger that makes or breaks us. What will matter a moment, a day, a week, a month, a year, from now? Are you IN for the WIN or are you in for the win-win for both of you?
Try to stay conscious when you are angry. Do you realize that it is way easier to go unconscious and simply go into the battle, rather than use your head and make strategies that will allow both of you to win?
When we get angry, it tends to make room for every grievance we have ever had to move into that action that might follow. It is time to stop……. An acronym…
S = Stop or at the very least, pause
T= Take a breath
O=Observe your body reactions
P=Proceed with awareness and composure
Winning means that you do not have to WIN, but you know when to let go. Consider that you do not ever have to win anything but your own control of your own self. Why waste time on the petty stuff?
Knowing the WHY someone might want to do battle is most important.
Once you know you have gained control over why you have risen to the bait, you acknowledge your feelings, and attempt to find the root of why you did so.
Understanding yourself and why you react can lead to you understanding that others have hidden agendas to their own anger. (Add-ons’ are those things that get added into the situation that do not belong there and have nothing to do with the Present moment). Both you and the one you disagree with, the one who gives rise to something inside you that causes you to react with anger, can lead to a peaceful resolution, or a peaceful walk away.
Yes, there are times you need to stand up for something you believe in. Yes, you cannot avoid feeling passionate about some things. Knowing what it is you believe and feel passionate about can null and void the ‘add-ons’ that get us all in to trouble.
We are worth more than our anger. We are worthy of more than what our anger might gain us.
In the long-run, what will it gain us to win? What might we lose? There is always a cost to us losing control of ourselves. Those costs can follow us to our deathbeds. Consider that.
I am one who has to really keep a close check on myself because my mouth runs and I end up saying things I will wish forever for NOT saying. The STOP is hard for me. I will continue to always learn what battles to pick and why. I need to learn to turn to Ares when such I feel tensions rise.
©Carol Desjarlais 1.1.23
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