STTS 144: Bitter Or Better

11/11/19 • 9 min

Have you ever had a moment of absolute anger? What about Outrage over something? A little indignation maybe?

Maybe things didn’t go your way in a situation. Somebody hurt you. A person close to you won’t hear what you are saying. A person wronged you. Someone took advantage of you. You felt disrespected

I’ve been there. I’ve lost my cool over plenty of things that were small. True misunderstanding when the other person didn’t mean it the way I took it.

What about something that is righteously wrong. There is no arguing about it. It was unfair, unjust and unwanted.

Something sexual abuse.

People who abuse the elderly.

Wanton violence that has no purpose but to hurt another.

I have. I’m probably the only one though... wink, wink. Of course, we’ve all been there. We’ve felt the anger at something unjust. We have felt indignation when we see another has had to suffer some indignity such as sexual abuse.

What if when we see things that could lead us to anger or bitterness, we could, in turn, use it to go somewhere better?

One day I'm watching Josh struggle to get into the truck. Nothing really new. He's had to relearn to do things we all take for granted. Walking, talking, eating. Getting run over by a couple of semi-trucks when you are three years old creates challenges in your life.

Today however his challenges were compounded by a neon green cast that encased his left arm. The result of falling over while simply walking. No tripping. Nobody pushing him or falling into him. He simply lost his balance.

As I'm watching him trying to get into the truck and struggling to figure this new scenario out of living with a cast on his arm.

I'm trying to figure it out myself. And as I’m trying to figure it out, I also notice that I'm feeling frustrated over the whole deal. I realize I'm lamenting our situation. I’m angry because we have to go through this as the result of nothing Josh did to himself. But as the result of someone else. The driver of a semi-truck that kept on rolling.

All the emotions of the past challenges and injuries and mishaps and disappointments come rushing into the present moment again.

My feelings of frustration for my son having to go through this are amplified from these events that exist in the past yet are haunting my present.

As I catch myself starting to feel bad about this, I realize I have a choice. I can see this as an ongoing tragedy with all the negative emotions and thoughts that go with it or an opportunity for me to reframe my own thoughts and meanings of the situation to something positive.

And I HAVE to choose. Consciously, I have to make a choice. Am I going to live in the past or the Present? See this as a Tragedy or a Triumph. Become Bitter or Better.

I decide to choose Better. To look for a Triumph. To see this as an opportunity to overcome a monumentally difficult situation that nobody would want in their life and turn it into something good.

The steeper the hill, the stronger the runner becomes.

I choose to be present. To stay relevant. I can't change what landed us here. I can, however, choose how I respond to it.

It took me a while to get to this point. I’m sharing it with you because I understand the emotions that go with life. They are all useful. Even the ones you or I would term negative.

Ones like bitterness, anger, rage. Those emotions point to something that is screaming for attention. Something that if we choose, can exist to make us better and stronger. Not angry and emotionally weaker.

I will never be able to serve my son while I'm limping around feeling sorry for myself or angry at the world. I can only be of value to him if I choose to live in the Present and help him to see his own situation in the best possible light.

I am not suggesting to anyone to sugar coat something. I mean if you take a pile of cow manure, put it in a box, put beautiful wrapping paper on the box and tie it up with a pretty bow, it’s still poop.

I can, however, take that horse manure, and with a little work and a little time, I can turn it into fertilizer and grow something beautiful or nourishing with it.

Bitter doesn’t move life forward. Bitter doesn’t leave us feeling good. Bitter doesn’t create positive energy in my life or yours.

This is our Path here on earth. This is our Journey. This is the road we travel on.

To hell with Bitter. I want Better.

Have you ever had a moment of absolute anger? What about Outrage over something? A little indignation maybe?

Maybe things didn’t go your way in a situation. Somebody hurt you. A person close to you won’t hear what you are saying. A person wronged you. Someone took advantage of you. You felt disrespected

I’ve been there. I’ve lost my cool over plenty of things that were small. True misunderstanding when the other person didn’t mean it the way I took it.

What about something that is righteously wrong. There is no arguing about it. It was unfair, unjust and unwanted.

Something sexual abuse.

People who abuse the elderly.

Wanton violence that has no purpose but to hurt another.

What if when we see things that could lead us to anger or bitterness, we could, in turn, use it to go somewhere better?

As I'm watching him trying to get into the truck and struggling to figure this new scenario out of living with a cast on his arm.

All the emotions of the past challenges and injuries and mishaps and disappointments come rushing into the present moment again.

My feelings of frustration for my son having to go through this are amplified from these events that exist in the past yet are haunting my present.

And I HAVE to choose. Consciously, I have to make a choice. Am I going to live in the past or the Present? See this as a Tragedy or a Triumph. Become Bitter or Better.

I decide to choose Better. To look for a Triumph. To see this as an opportunity to overcome a monumentally difficult situation that nobody would want in their life and turn it into something good.

The steeper the hill, the stronger the runner becomes.

I choose to be present. To stay relevant. I can't change what landed us here. I can, however, choose how I respond to it.

It took me a while to get to this point. I’m sharing it with you because I understand the emotions that go with life. They are all useful. Even the ones you or I would term negative.

I can, however, take that horse manure, and with a little work and a little time, I can turn it into fertilizer and grow something beautiful or nourishing with it.

Bitter doesn’t move life forward. Bitter doesn’t leave us feeling good. Bitter doesn’t create positive energy in my life or yours.

This is our Path here on earth. This is our Journey. This is the road we travel on.

To hell with Bitter. I want Better.

Previous Episode

STTS 143: A Christian and a Buddhist Walk Into A...

When Your System in Life Isn’t Working

Welcome Back. What we are going to chat about today is how to overwhelm can get us off track and how to overcome that. Let’s get to it.

First of all, THANK YOU, to everyone who is hearing this today. I appreciate you and the fact that you took the time to listen in. These podcasts can only help if they are heard. Please share them with your friends and family.

Does it ever seem as if at the end of the day things are not going your way?

I mean you care.

You aren’t lazy.

You are working super hard every day.

When the day is over you are definitely tired.

You are trying to do your best with all of your responsibilities.

But in spite of your best efforts, things aren’t going well or in the direction, you hoped for. Maybe things in your life aren’t changing for the better and you almost feel as if your wheels are spinning and you are stuck in place.

There was a time when I felt exactly like that. Actually, there have been a number of times in my life where I went through a period just like that.

A number of years ago, the grandmother of one of my students came in with her grandson Edgar. She walked over to me and asked if she could speak to me. They had been a part of my school for a number of years at this point. I had a few minutes, so I was more than happy to oblige.

She told me she had a book that I might find helpful. She said the reason she was asking was that she had noticed how tired, run down and stressed I looked all the time.

As far as how I looked, I had to agree with her. Inside I felt the way I looked in the mirror and to the world.

So this nice grandmother, who was a practicing Buddhist, handed me a book on Buddhism. I wasn’t surprised. People make all kinds of suggestions if they think they can be helpful. I was already familiar with some elements of Buddhism. And while I never practiced it, I had used some techniques in my own life.

The following week I read the book. It was good. I enjoyed it and it was helpful to me towards understanding all that I was experiencing in my life at the time. Grief from my son being hurt. Fatigue from caring for him. Frustration with dealing with his mother. Struggling to keep my business afloat. Fighting to keep my attitude positive.

The problem was that I was a Christian who wasn’t practicing what I knew from my faith.

I didn’t have anything against Buddhism but it dawned on me, I wasn’t doing the things I already knew. What good would another system do me if I wasn’t using what I already had?

This isn’t me coming at this from a theological position. It’s about our psychology. You see, excluding any theology, it doesn’t always matter what system you choose to go through life with. But if you choose a system but aren’t using it, then you don’t get any benefit from it.

I wasn’t working the system so the system couldn’t work for me.

If I have a system for building a strong marriage and it works for others but I don’t use it, I won’t get the benefits.

It’s the same with food choices and exercise or finances.

If I have a budget but don’t use it, I exclude myself from its benefit.

If I have an exercise plan but don’t use it, I will continue to get weaker over time. Switching to a new program will only help me if I actually use the program as directed.

My problem was I wasn’t using the system, which was my Faith walk, to help me cope with and get through my challenges. Switching to another system whether it is Buddhism, Daoism or Cognitive Behavior and Meditation won’t get me what I want and need unless I put it to work for me by doing the work of the system.

When I got back to prayer, scripture reading, meditation and study, things started to change for me. I saw the world differently and in turn, the world saw me differently. My energy, my attitude, my behaviors started to reflect what was happening to me from the inside out.

We have to learn to take care of ourselves and remember put into play those things that will work as soon as we put the work in.

That’s it for today. Hope this was helpful

So that’s the lesson for me. If I don’t work the system, the system won’t work for me.

My son had been badly injured in a hit and run collision with two semi-trucks. He needed around the clock care due to a massive traumatic brain injury. His recovery was on my mind 24/7.

My business was shrinking by the day and at what point was down by 90%. As a result, I was in the middle of a foreclosure on our home, bankruptcy as well as my truck being repossessed. I didn’t even know how I was going to get my son to his therapy appointments which were a total of twelve per week.

I was in a relationship that was difficult at best. Unfortunately, it was with the mother of my son and at the time, it was 100% dysfunctional. A frie...

Next Episode

STTS 145: Nourishing Life

My wife and I are on vacation in the Dominican Republic. This episode is not about how I live some amazing life, although it is amazing in many ways. It’s not about who we live a life of luxury, traveling to exotic places and living where we want and how we want. It’s about how change for the positive can happen when the environment for it exists.

Six years-ago Teresa and I were at the very same resort in the DR. We arrived the second day it was open. We opted to take the trip then because the price was outstanding by virtue of being new.

At the time the staff was not that fluent in English and we weren’t fluent in Spanish so sometimes we had a little language barrier. Also, there were many things all over the resort that weren’t completed or ready.

Some of the restaurants weren’t open that first week and many of the listed resort activities weren’t ready. The beach was in good shape and the pool was in good shape and while we aren’t much for drinking, it seemed the bars were all fully staffed and fully stocked.

We were told by the staff not to drink the tap water as it had the possibility of making us sick. We appreciated that bit of info about the water and took it seriously using only bottled water to drink and went so far as to use bottled water to brush our teeth as well.

That was all OK. We are pretty easy going and understand the world isn’t perfect. complete. We had a great time relaxing on the beach, jumping waves in the ocean and enjoying the delicious, fresh fruits, vegetables and wonderful meals that were prepared for us.

Being a new resort, the surrounding decorative vegetation was just being planted. There was more dirt to be seen than plants and flowers. The property, because the vegetation that was planted, was only planted recently did not have the time to grow to its normal beauty.

As my wife and I walked the property she mentioned how she wondered what it would look like had it all been filled in and the plants had time to grow and mature. Needless to say, it didn’t happen by the end of the week that we were there.

Here we are six years later. The difference is profound. Every square inch of the property is absolutely beautiful and filled with perfectly manicured flowers, bushes, ornamentals, and trees.

The four to six-foot palm trees newly planted in 2013 are now twelve to sixteen feet tall in all of the atrium gardens of each building. The fifteen to twenty-foot palm trees around the exteriors of the buildings are now thirty to forty feet tall.

The decorative gardens surrounding the buildings are perfectly manicured and completely filled in throughout the property. Purple flowers abound and you can hardly see dirt in any of the landscaping because they are so full of assorted greenery and flowers.

All of this happened in six short years because the environment was right for growth. Sun, warmth, rain, somebody caring for and tending to the needs of the plants.

In Chinese culture and martial arts, we would say that is Yang Sheng. Nourishing or Nurturing Life. As a matter of fact, I believe it is so important that we say it at the beginning and end of all our classes.

We say yang sheng in the spirit of not only nourishing our life but also the lives of those around us. Most of my students only spend a few hours a week with me or my staff. We say Yang Sheng when we train with each other multiple times throughout class at the beginning and end of each exercise, while looking each other in the eye, as a way of promoting what we want for ourselves and others.

The idea of nourishing or nurturing life is meant to be taken with us out into the world. Home, school, work, activities, hobbies. Everywhere.

This is also something you can do in your own corner of the world whether at work or at home.

What if you could start the day with the idea that I will nourish life at work or home or school or while out shopping for that matter?

How about starting with the idea that when I am speaking with my children, coworkers, husband, wife, in-laws, extended family, boss, coworkers, employees I started with the heart-centered idea of all conversations and actions start with Nourishing life.

This has made a profound change in my life. I’ve struggled with staying positive at times in my life. I always want to be positive but sometimes, when my load has been especially heavy it was harder. I would lose my place because of the challenges.

When I decided to be purposeful about reminding myself about Nourishing Life, mine and others, I became more positive, forward-focused and energetic. Framing my day, my work and my relationships with Yang Sheng helped immensely in making more positive choices and actions in my body, mind, and Spirit. It makes me feel better because I’m actually doing better by asking myself, how can I nourish life here.

I challenge you to do the same....