If Only…

Terri Cole writes:

Last week’s theme of focusing your energy on what you can do rather than on what makes your feel powerless continues this week as we explore the concept of Living in Non-Reality.

Start by asking yourself if you are in acceptance of certain factual aspects of your life, even if they are not exactly what you want them to be at the moment.

Let’s look at a common example in our lives today – traffic. When you are sitting in traffic, do you complain that if your boss hadn’t called you into a 4:45 pm meeting and you left right at 5pm as planned, you would not be sitting in traffic right now? This line of thinking is living in Non-Reality, and it can permeate all areas of your life if you are not aware of it.

Years ago when I was living in L.A. and spending many hours of my life sitting in traffic, I became aware of my non-reality based inner dialogue. My frustration at “wasting” time inspired elaborate stories of how it was someone else’s fault that I was caught up, and if the facts were just not the facts, I would be freely speeding down the PCH without a care. After a few futile weeks of this behavior, I decided to stop wasting my energy and re-framed my mind about traffic time.

Instead of spinning my wheels (no pun intended), I decided traffic time was my time to restore, to put space between my home and office life. In the morning, it gave me a chance to prepare for the day ahead, and in the evening, it gave me a chance to let go of the daily frustrations and not bring them into my peaceful home. I listened to books on tape, podcasts from interesting speakers and brushed up on my Spanish. This was a much better use of my time than ruminating about whose fault it was that the light turned red before I could cross the intersection.

Although we do have the power to actively change many aspects of our lives, there will always be situations that are out of our control. Your empowerment is in how you manage these events. Can you accept the things you cannot change and surrender to how it is rather than rail against it? Can you find the silver lining, like quality alone time, even when you’re sitting in traffic?

Source: If Only…!

Watch Terri here…