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Today's
Meditation:
As
crazy as it sounds, there seem to be many people who are
more comfortable laying their heads on a pillow of
thorns. If they can hold on to hurts, after all,
then they may be justified in feeling bad for
themselves. They can allow themselves to feel the
martyr, for after all, their bad feelings are someone
else's fault. It's much easier for some of us to be
victims-- or to allow ourselves to feel like victims--
than
it is to take responsibility for our own feelings and
actually consider something like forgiveness.
But
I decide which pillow I use at night. I decide if I
lay my head down on a soft surface, a thorny one, or a bed
of stone. I decide whether I forgive or whether
I hold on to a hurt-- and with that decision come many,
many results. And those results help to determine
what our lives are like after the decision is made.
Life
isn't about holding on to hurts and feeling sorry for
ourselves. Life is about learning and growing and
changing and developing ourselves as loving, compassionate
human beings. The road to love and compassion is a
long one for most of us, though, and we don't need more
things to hold us back from reaching the new points of
development on the way, nor do we need anything that would
make the journey more difficult, such as a pillow of
thorns that will hurt us, make us very uncomfortable, and
keep us from getting the rest we need to get on with our
lives.
I
want to sleep well tonight, but the thorns of resentment
will keep me from sleeping deeply. I can get rid of
those thorns with a decision, though-- perhaps not an easy
decision, but a decision undoubtedly and indisputably
within my power to make.
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