We all face challenges. Trials, turmoil, curses, catastrophes, bad days, whatever you call it, we all have them. Some people have events in their lives that are so horrendous that society as a whole wonders how they keep going, getting up each morning with a smile on their face and trudging forward. Some of us have challenges that to us personally are huge and overwhelming and yet are nothing compared to what other people have suffered. The point is that no matter what challenge you currently face in your life, it serves a purpose.
If you believe that you alone can choose how to react to the challenge and keep fighting your way through it, the challenge (trial) can give you strength, wisdom, and empathy. You can become stronger, kinder and less judgmental. You can become the person you were meant to be, the hero of your own life story. That being said, you can also choose to be miserable, bitter and a victim through these challenges. You choose how to react and how to "be" through the situation.
Growing up in Alaska, my dad would check out movies (along with the 8 mm projector) from the university library and we would watch them instead of watching television. (we didn't have a television, and actually I still don't). One of the movies I remember was called "You pack your own chute". It was about a lady who decided to overcome her fear of heights by skydiving. One of the concepts from this movie I have kept with me all of these years, was that we choose how to react when something wrong happens to us. In the movie the lady was driving with her grandfather and another car ran a stop sign and she almost hit them. She told her grandfather how that other person had made her so mad. Her grandfather replied, "So that other person controls how you feel?" His lesson to his granddaughter was that she chose how to react to a bad situation, or when someone "wronged" her. The other person didn't make that decision for her.
This is how to face challenges, we decide how to "be" or react. Let go of being a victim, let go of blaming others for your trials or challenges. Trials are just experiences on this journey of life. Experience it, learn from it and then become a better person because of it. This won't happen overnight, but each time you go to complain about how you have been wronged by someone, or how something bad is happening to you, remember, you choose to how you react. Take the lesson from what has been given to you, and then leave the bad in the past and move forward to the good experiences that await you.
Let go of the fear that can accompany challenges and trials, look for ways to love in the midst of such experiences. Write loving thoughts to those who you feel have hurt you and have brought you pain. You will find that love can overcome any negative feeling and you can be the person you truly want to be as you go through the rough and the wonderful experiences of life.
Remember, you pack your own chute, just like you choose what you carry with you from each experience. Let go of the garbage, and keep the beauty in this journey. Let go of the anger and blame, keep the peace and the love.
