There is an effect when being a human and that is when one decides whether to change something about themselves or to do something in a different way or whether to remain in place as to how things are. It is perhaps an evolutionary pull to remain who we are and within the confines of what is seen as what is our reality, and this is because there are a myriad if not an infinite number of ways that reality can be understood and acted upon, and letting go of this in exchange for another is by itself a tremendous task.
Yet there are events in our lives that can lead us to engage in this exchange from the old view of the world to the new. These negative events are ones that test our mental map of the world, ones that contradict our facts of what life and its elements are all about. A kind of negative event stands out more than others and that is when we are deceived by others. This would lead to us to reconsider who to trust again and who to confide in again, with the closer the individual was to us then the harsher the penalty of our broken trust. Such broken trust may be also seen to include heartbreak, for we would need to learn again how to trust our love to someone else. Perhaps a rejection due to personal ailments would put us on the spot, the pain that we would associate our negative attributes to the rejection may lead us wanting to do better, to be better so as to not repeat the past events.
Yet it could not be as obvious as so, that the events mentioned here are not sufficient for a change to take place. One could say that what they have experienced wasn’t due to one’s own deficiencies but that it was the way of the world, that one’s own adaptations are correct and it is part of the adversity to endure in the world. Or perhaps that it is acceptable to be treated poorly due to personal beliefs that justify the negative events such as abuse or negative states of being, beliefs that psychology calls them as introjections. If one does this, if one believes and forms part of himself these negative ideas, then there isn’t a need to change oneself, the world view remains intact, with the abuse becoming another fit in the puzzle.
At times it is these invisible beliefs that keep us perpetuating our state of inaction. It is these walls which we don’t see or feel, forming part of what is beyond our immediate perception, chains that keep us put to where we are, adhering to the rules of the world which we learnt to live by and survive in. Sometimes it is referred to as if we were programmed to live this way, with no other sight on what else the world might be, on who we might be to it as well.
Yet not all is at a loss. These ailments albeit invisible will not remain as so until someone or something makes us aware of such walls and chains for the confining effect of what they are. We may become inspired by others that lead us to see ourselves as more capable than what we think and more able than what we can imagine, that change is indeed possible and growth is in fact a way of being and not just a single act of will, that freedom is more than practising one’s choices but to choose more for yourself and for your own value. It is perhaps the tragedy of this world that we do not venture beyond the confines of our perception, unable to question what is binding us to our state of being, not because of our inability to question, but because what binds us is beyond our grasp and invisible to our immediate perception.
But if one is to ask sincerely on what merits one ought to live one’s life, that if all things being equal then how one could picture themselves in their best form, then the answers would be astounding as well as contrasting to what is the one’s present state. Perhaps it is this that is missing in this world of ours, that there are too many distractions and living for survival’s sake to be able to question oneself on such ideas of depth and meaning, that we don’t find the time to ask ourselves the important questions. Yet one needs to ask: who are you? What do you want ? And what are the self-defeating behaviours that are keeping you in a never ending cycle of self destructiveness? Maybe it is time to ask oneself these questions and not be afraid of the answers you give to yourself. As there isn’t a better place than here and now to let go of what you have come to accept and make a change for the better.
Let the truth guide you to the far reaches of who you could become, for you have been someone else other than yourself for long enough a time.
