annus horribilis

This Year of the Rooster annus horribilis continues to roll on. I usually don't look forward to the shenanigans of New Year, but this year I am impatient for the holiday season. We won't be in a completely new phase until Chinese New Year kicks in around February 2018, but from my experience things start to change when 2017 ends. At the beginning of the year, for several reasons, I suspected it was going to be a head down, bum up, one-foot-in-front-of-the-other slog and that's how it has been.

I am pretty sure most humans only learn significant life lessons from adversity. If you think about it, you've probably never learnt much that was useful from having a good time (apart from the joy of life which is positive, however in the human realm - if there is joy, there is also suffering). When things get tough you look deeper into life and search for ways to deal with it. After years of frustration on a particular issue I finally decided conflict offered an opportunity to change my perspective and even more importantly, that nothing would change until I had done so. After doing some research on how Buddhists deal with negative situations I found this bit of wisdom from the Dalia Lama:

We have such a low tolerance for negativity, whether internal or external. Much of our culture is based on this running away, hiding and avoiding of pain and suffering. Yet if we were to stay with our experience, in the present moment, whether that experience be what we deem “positive” or “negative”, internal or external, we find a place of deep healing and peace. By allowing room or space for both joy and sorrow, pleasure and pain, we transcend these emotions and connect with our inner peace.

I have avoided both Christianity and Buddhism because I have been unable to reconcile with the idea that if challenged, we should simply 'turn the other cheek.' It just seemed so wrong to allow other people to get away with not taking responsibility for their actions, so I was relieved to find this also: 

Acceptance doesn’t mean being a door mat - accepting the realities of your life as they are does not mean complete passivity. You can take whatever action feels authentic and appropriate in order to resolve the situation, but you try to do this from a place of acceptance, with a peaceful mind and with positive, wholesome intentions for the greater good of all concerned. If anger arises, if the thought “how dare they”, or “they have no right!” arises, it arises out of ego, out of that small sense of self. However, if you can see that another’s behaviour is harming themselves, you and everyone involved, providing them with feedback is often the best approach. Otherwise, they will continue to act unskilfully and harmfully, creating negative Karma, the conditions for future unhappiness and suffering, for themselves and others. The difference between this response and one driven by the ego is often invisible to the outside world, the difference is internal, one of attitude and intention. Then, the hard part – let go, forgive and move on.

I'm committed to working on this way of dealing with conflict in future. The bonus is that this insight has exposed how my deeply entrenched negative thought patterns create my reality. So I have started working on that too. The strategy is quite simple really - first step is just being aware, take note and breathe, recognise or as my old guru would say, 'label' the illusion/delusion, embrace the opportunity for insight and then, most importantly as the Dalia Lama says: let go, forgive and move on. 

“May all circumstances serve to awaken heart and mind, especially those circumstances I deem to be challenging, and may my life be of benefit to all beings.”

https://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-3103/To-Protect-or-to-Accept-A-Buddhist-response-to-Negativity.html