Why? Was it given you on entering life to choose and say, “Let such a one marry such a one at this hour, that I may be born?”
No such choice was given you: your parents had to be in existence first, and your birth had to follow.
Of what parents? Of such as they were.
I suppose all children will have times when they resent their parents; I imagine this has less to do with the vices of the parents than the painful, yet necessary, growth of the children.
I don’t recall that I ever wanted to have different parents, though I do recall wishing they would be more amenable to doing whatever I happened to prefer at that moment.
I have quite often, however, dreamed about how wonderful my life would be, if only this or that event had not occurred, or if I had been saved from crossing paths with one or another person.
Yes, but it wasn’t really the event that troubled me, was it? It all hinges upon how I reacted to it then, and how I continue reacting to it now. If I have no objection within myself to a rainy day, I will not find myself being angry about rainy days whenever they come around.
It is quite the same with certain people. That they lived, or where or when or how they lived, did not have to be so terrible for me, if only I had not formed my unhealthy attachments as I did. Nor is there any need for regret, since I can still modify those attachments, if only I put my mind to it.
Besides, the very fact that I now know something more about what is good or bad for me, that I have struggled to become better through those circumstances, would itself become impossible without having lived through such experiences. If I pray it had not happened, then the self who does the praying would no longer exist.
It was not made for me to decide where I came from, or how the world around me will unfold. That is not a limitation at all, but a liberation of the finest sort, where I can learn to be fully myself in a harmony with Nature, to finally be responsible for my relationships with others. I am not disposable, and neither are they.
Did an attempt at love, for example, meet with feeling abandoned, cast aside in favor of the next convenient conquest? That can be a good thing, because it means I can now have a deeper sense of what true friendship entails, and this will, in turn, help me to never again confuse love with lust.
“But she broke me. I can’t get beyond it.”
The proof that this is not true is how there are thousands more just like her out there, and not a single one of them broke you. Admit that you broke yourself, by making your happiness dependent on the whims of someone else, and now admit that you have the power to fix yourself.
No comments:
Post a Comment