Another perspective June 19, 2008
Posted by admin in : Irritations Tags:awareness, ego, negativity , trackbackIf you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
Conscious awareness is the key to a healthy relationship because it enables you to communicate through your essential nature instead of in your mind, which just conjures up ridiculous thoughts and unnecessary emotions. When we live in thought forms or the ego-driven self, we do not respond to situations from a place of love, which is why I got so mad this evening when my friend told me he was going to be late for dinner.
We had plans to go out after my yoga, which usually gets out around 7:15-7:30. I brought a change of clothes with me since we were meeting between 7:45 and 8:00 and I wouldn’t have the time to go home first. At 7:30 I got a text message saying he was going to be late and asked if we could meet at 8:30. I was irritated because I didn’t have the option to go home and suddenly had 45 minutes to burn. It might not have bothered me as much had he not been late the last time we got together, but making a girl wait twice is not what I call “earning brownie points” and I hate waiting…especially since I’m one of those people who is always on time.
My initial knee-jerk reaction went something like this, “What? He’s going to be late AGAIN??? I should have known !#$%^&* (that’s me cursing). Lovely…I see how important I am and what a priority our date is to him. And why is he going to be late? Because he was at the gym and didn’t realize the time? It’s rude to keep someone waiting…especially a second time! It’s inconsiderate. He knew what time we were suppose to meet…why couldn’t he schedule his time accordingly. It’s not rocket science. Now I have to sit and wait and I HATE to wait, but whatever, right? What other option do I have at this point? Be mad…tell him I don’t want to meet him anymore?”
My ego wanted to be mad, but I didn’t want to be mad…what a waste of beautiful energy! I had to interrupt all the nonesense running through my mind so I took a deep breath and then thought about it from a different perspective.
The flip side went something like this, “Oh, who cares…he’s going to be late…it’s nothing new…he’s always late. He’s not really being inconsiderate or disrespecting our relationship…he’s just one of those people who gets caught up in the moment and is never really worried about planning ahead. He’s always running around at the last minute taking care of stuff…it didn’t matter if he was getting on an airplane or moving out of an apartment or an office space or going to a wedding or meeting me for dinner…he just always seemed to be on ”his” time.
Does this mean he’s wrong and I’m right because I’m always on time and he’s always late? Of course not. It just means that we are different and we have different habits and sometimes our habits conflict. It’s life and you can’t change someone just because their priorities are different than yours. Sure, I could have been mad at him, but that would have ruined our entire evening. My other option was to let it go and be at peace with what was happening.
As it turned out, I ended up getting all turned around and got lost so had he not been late, it would have been me…either way we weren’t there by 8:00 and there was a wait anyway so what was the big deal, right? I ended up ordering myself a drink from the bar and just hanging out watching people come and go. It was a beautiful evening and the moon was full so it was actually nice having the space to just “be!”
Had I allowed myself to get upset the evening would have been quite different and not so peaceful so I’m glad I made the choice to let it go. It certainly takes a lot more energy to be negative so why even bother? Try it sometime. Just be aware of the next time you feel yourself starting to get upset with someone and use it as an opportunity to see things differently. You’ll be amazed at the difference in how you react. All it takes is a little self-awareness and life gets easier.
Some critics would say, “Well it IS rude to be late and keep someone waiting and you shouldn’t let it go without speaking your truth.” I say, “Who cares? Does it really matter? He’s not going to change whether or not I get upset about it. It’s my decision whether or not to go out with him knowing he will probably be late so I only have myself to blame. I have to accept him for who he is and if I can’t then I shouldn’t make plans with him. We all have the choice to react negatively or just stay in a beautiful space. Thoughts are extremely powerful and if looking at life in a more positive way brings a sense of peace and equanimity than why waste time on being negative? It just doesn’t make sense.
Comments»
If it bothers you so much now, and it’s someone with whom you plan on trying a relationship, it’s probably a topic that needs to come up. Otherwise, in the not too distant future that ‘nice’ part of you will start having some tougher battles with the ‘what the $#@! side”.