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Today's
Meditation:
How
difficult it can be to free ourselves from our commitment
to social norms and rules. Sometimes it seems that
our lives are ruled by people outside of ourselves-- as
soon as someone plans to have a party or a dinner, then
all of a sudden our plans are made, too, even though we
might have wanted to spend a quiet evening at home on that
particular night. And declining the invitation is
difficult because we fear that we may offend the hosts.
How
do we reach a point at which we take no actions that are
based upon fear of how other people may feel? It
would be much easier, of course, if other people didn't
get offended easily by something like a declined dinner
invitation, but them taking offense is their reality and
it doesn't have to be ours. How do we reach a point
at which we feel comfortable enough with ourselves that we
make our own decisions about what we want to do based on
what we know is best for us?
These
aren't easy questions to answer. But Jules' words
are very important words to ponder if we value our
freedoms as much as most of us seem to. Not all
dinner invitations are negative, but he's not talking
about just those here-- he's talking about having the
freedom and the strength to make decisions for ourselves
and not finding it necessary to explain each decision that
we make to others. Given this criterion, I'm not
quite sure just how free I am, but I know that if I
weren't concerned about how the hosts would take it, I'd
gladly decline if I didn't want to go. Just how much
does my concern for how others will act affect other areas
of my life?
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