How do we live? What can I do different without any major overhaul or drastic adjustments?
Change is occurring all around me every day of my life. The construction crews are building something or other new and a tree in a forest is falling all by itself. Now that it is Autumn the leaves are on the ground, they are no longer green and no longer on the branches of trees up high. Brown leaves om the ground. Changes are also happening inside of me. If we have any doubt consider this, my finger nails keep needing to be cut. My hair continues to grow and occasionally my stomach is a different size and shape.
Convinced yet?
The point of taking a look at this today perhaps is brought on by the obvious changes in our natural scenery because of nature and the season of Autumn. While all is changing around us and for everything outside of ourselves we will refer to them as EXTERNAL INFLUENCES. Knowing and remaining aware that there are a bunch of things happening inside of us too. To all of these external influences we have an INTERNAL RESPONSE.
What is the big deal?
When we see something, anything for that matter, let’s say we are walking down a street and we see a bird in a half bare tree. We may think for a moment about how free he is to hang out and fly off when he wishes. We can have a thought about the bird in the tree. Things we may not have noticed were the colour of the buildings that line that street or the colour, make and models of the cars parked along that same street and so we do not allow for why or how we had our little thought about the bird though all of the external influences played a part in how we had our thought.
Now let”s factor in some more obvious things like other humans. A buzz word of these days is a little word called “triggered” or “triggers”. Because of these words becoming used more often nowadays we might be beginning to understand how things from outside of us cam stir up something inside of us. Sounds pretty straight forward and simple, doesn’t it?
So why do we have a triggered INTERNAL RESPONSE to an EXTERNAL INFLUENCE? And more importantly what control do we have over any of it?
I am human and I do have responses to things outaide of me that influence how I respond and what I think and sometimes even whether I will turn left or right. When I learmed about how I react to one thing or another I was fascinated. I really began to see how I had the option given to me of how I respond. There is a milisecond offered to me as to whether I react off the cuff based upon the external influence or I pause for a moment and then respond. My response may have a feelimg attached or may just be a thought.When I take a moment to pause and become aware that I am feeling something based upon what has been prrsented to me or what I am faced with, I get to respond in a way that suits me and is less of the triggered auto response, which to be honest has never really served me too well. We call these reactions and then hide behind an idea of how we were triggered by something somebody said and we look to be justified in our reaction. Our options are react or respond. Respond calling for the moment to pause first and respond accordingly to what we may ne feeling.
An example
Recently Ireland (My Country) were defeated in the world cup rugby quarter finals. The national rugby team’s good run came to an end and the team were sent home. Their losing in the match was an external influence, a trigger point for me as I am Irish and I am a fan of the game of rugby. I was saddened by the result and the excitement of who do Ireland play next and looking forward to the games all had left me and would no longer be. The end result was sad. Did I cry for weeks for this? No. Did I get angry and snappy at every little situation that next day? No. I was simply sad about it.
So what the heck does all that have to with anything?
External influence = Ireland lose in the rugby match.
Internal response = Saddened by it as an Irish rugby fan.
Pause moment = Thought process of understanding that the result of the game did indeed make me have a sad feeling yet knowing that no matter how my response was it would not change the result of the game. Because I feel sad and wanted a different outcome for the team, it will not happen just becaise I want it to or because I have a sad feeling.
Then I got to really think about it and wondered to myself how many times do things happen outside of me that I am influenced by and how do I respond? What kind of respinse do I have and where does my response come from? I have found that without the pause momemt in between it is no longer a response and is then only a reaction. A reaction is fine if I spill some hot tea or coffee on my leg while sitting down, I react with a little jump perhaps. This kind of reaction is fine. Sometimes we may have heard of things like reflex reaction or involuntary reaction. When it comes to how I reply, respond, react are all things I do have control over. When I take a milisecond of time to pause I can now respond with clear thought, I can have a response now rather than a reaction.
The human that I am and yes just like you we are human first and foremost. It is quite common to react to things and it is also quite common place to respond also. Factors which we may have never noticed how our eyes and our mind are picking up on many external influences all of the time. Advertis8ng for example has mastered the art of planting seeds inside of our brain without us ever noticing, we are bombarded daily with “Agendas” of all different kinds. Some may to be sway us into buying one particular brand of something and even deeper then some of these subliminal messaging tactics used on us may be to sway our political decision making. Being human simply mrans these days that we are subject to a vast amount of external influences daily. Our priorty need be with ourselves first.
We can begin to see clearer when we ask ourselves.
Am I reacting or am I responding?
Then we may look at another simply question.
Does it matter that much to me and can I change any of the outcome?
Should we decide to ignore all that we are involved with daily in terms of our reaponses and reactions then we may very well be allowing those things outaide of us control us and we wander aimlessly through life unaware of how we tick on the inside. When we do pay attention and become more self aware we can open the magic gates to a more peaceful internal workings of self. We can begin to recognise where we do have power over our very own life. We can begin to see that it is not a case of “it is them who drive me mad” “they make me angry” or even “I get so upset by the x y z”. I can begin to look inside and use my power to pause and reapond to how I feel about the external influence and I can begin to take care of my inner self and see that when I am im charge of me that my life can become a very pleasant experience. The external influences will remain the same, it is within me that will become differemt and be the point of change where I can do my work. It is inside of me that can make the entire difference over my entire life.
Imagine a life where I am in charge of my own life. It is not the issues that are raised outside of me that matter. What matters is how I deal with them. It matters how I respond. It matters how I make changes that suit me and are not led by external influence.
I do of course feel strongly that you will the sense in me posting this today and why you needed to read it. Your triggers can now be minimized and your inner core self can respond in a way which is morw of the rral you and not some heavily bombarded person who has lost track of what way is up.
There are never any subliminal messages in any of posts and so the words above are simply as they read. Now that you have began to think that it all means something else, it doesn’t (lol).
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