I was reading in May’s Science of Mind magazine about monotony – doing the same thing over and over and over, and getting the same results, including the same complaints about life.
Traditional wisdom holds that insanity is doing the same thing over and over and over and expecting a different outcome. We won’t go there today.
Living life with regular repetition supports us. It is helpful to not have to find a new place to sleep every night. Looking for a new job every day would be exhausting.
This particular reading focused on living and thinking the same way, every day, all day long. Now if your life is “humming along” nicely and you are happy with the way things are, why change? The only thing that comes to my mind is “more of the same, please.”
On the other hand, there is that tendency all humans have to look for what is not right in our lives. In other words, complaints. A complaint is nothing more than a decision we make that life is not the way we think it should be or want it to be. A complaint is suffering – realizing that we want something else other than what is.
Suffering is a feeling, an indicator that we are hurting in some way. Suffering tends to lend itself to defining situations that we might be totally powerless over like the death of a loved one. We suffer in that person’s absence, but most of us seek ways to help us feel better. If we endure our grief and see that process through to the end, most of us find ways to regain our happiness level.
A complaint is a verbalization of our suffering and tends to be a judgment in our minds that we don’t like how we are, or what happens, or who someone is, or what a person does, or how life is. If repetitious complaints are showing up in our lives, we need to do something . . . anything . . . different, but it requires changing the way we think. In support of a new way of thinking, DO something different even if you are the only person who knows it is different.
The more we let go of what is wrong, the more we find what is right.
©2010 by Barbara L. Kass
Tags: change, complaining, happiness, suffering
Eternal Presence 
May 17, 2010 at 7:50 am |
“… DO something different even if you are the only person who knows it is different. The more we let go of what is wrong, the more we find what is right.”
Barbara, I wish you could see me right now. My bare feet are dancing a little jig. This is so, So, SO impotant! This is the thing that needs to be shouted from the roof tops. POSITIVE ACTION. Great way to launch the week! Thank you.
Laurie Buchanan
http://holessence.wordpress.com/
May 17, 2010 at 9:10 pm |
Hi, Laurie — well, my week has been launched! It was a long day, I had January over for dinner and am just now relaxing enough to respond. There is a lot to be said for positive thinking, but it requires a little bit of action to reinforce the message.
May 17, 2010 at 9:01 am |
Thanks to Laurie for pointing me in this direction this morning…
Barbara,
I think you two have 24@ today. This is dead on as to where I am going with my thoughts today.
You both are in sync…
I will try to be on the Gaia call this morning
Please Note: My E-Mail has changed to Snoopykg2@aol.com.
Kim
http://butterfliesgalore.wordpress.com
May 17, 2010 at 9:03 am |
You two have ESP not 24@!!
Blackberry Error!!!
May 17, 2010 at 9:21 am |
Just read a great article in USA Today
Rational Mind seeks change, while emotional mind seeks comfort.
Tidbits to explore today.
Kim
May 17, 2010 at 9:11 pm |
Kim — I think 24@ is sort of cool . . . like being “on” all the time (24 hours a day). I will have to read the USA Today article because I float between needing change while seeking the comforts of the familiar . . .
May 17, 2010 at 10:03 am |
Barbara, you have struck another chord on my heartstrings today. I need to do something different. I am boring myself, something that very seldom happens. I have been so ingrown lately worrying about “what if?” that I am rudely telling myself to shut up. I have been planning to go down to the Art Institute for some while now and check out the art supply store, they have wonderful water color pens there that I want to play with. So I think I’ll just cruise on down there and check them out. I went to the Cherokee County Arts Festival in Canton yesterday and it reminded me that I have not touched a pen to paper lately unless it was to sign a check or document. I believe I’ll go play a little hooky at school today, how’s that for different? Thanks for the inspiration!
May 17, 2010 at 9:15 pm |
Sandi — I hope you got your pretty colors and crayons! I love coloring stuff. When Bethany was little, we would sit side by side coloring in her coloring books. I don’t have nearly the talent you have, but I love putting colors all over paper. And don’t worry about that “what if” thing; what you should worry about is “what if I live to be 110 and spend all those years worried that I wouldn’t last this long?”