Anger in the Way

Acceptance necessitates enduring those things that you cannot change. It is not becoming a doormat, but rather understanding what you can change, what is outside your locus of control, and focusing your efforts on change and influence that is within your power, letting others be themselves while you allow yourself to be yourself. Once we realized that much is outside our realm of power, change, and control, we can stop allowing it to overpower us, surrendering our will to a God greater than ourselves.

Many emotions and belief systems get in our way of surrendering our will and focusing on what is within our power to change and influence, understanding our limitations. Anger can be a healthy emotion and it can also be a destructive emotion if we allow it to overpower our own power or if we use it in an attempt to get others to become what we desire them to be. Anger can stand in the face of acceptance, capturing our soul, life direction, and relationships, convincing us we need to “fight to be right”, and yet at the end of being right, there is no price that awaits us.

Thomas Kempis wrote, “Be not angry that you cannot make others as you wish them to be, since you cannot make yourself as you wish to be”.  Funny how anger is a tool we use to force others into what we cannot live up to ourselves. Acceptance and positive change cannot occur without surrendering our will and our lives, accepting ourselves as we are, faults, struggles, and positive character traits alike. Only through acceptance can we begin to make the forward journey our inner beings so desire to take.

Accept today what is yours, accept today the reality of the world and those who live in it, and accept your responsibility to grow towards God to become all that He has created you to be, allowing others to become what they are created to be, realizing where your power lies and where the center of your control begins and ends.


(The writings in this post are random thoughts and observations and are NEVER intended as professional or personal advice. Take what works and leave the rest. For information on mental health and/or substance abuse help, visit http://www.rodneyvalandra.com and refer to the links page.)

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