A Great Book

I just finished reading Eat Pray Love and found it to be one of the most real and inspiring books I've read in a long time. It is filled with real, honestly described emotions and true, heartfelt, non-judgemental self evaluation. It appealed to me because I have been on a journey of self discovery and understanding for awhile now and only wish I was able to copy what she was able to do...to leave the real world for a year on a quest of self healing and self discovery.

I've earmarked many quotes and list here a few that particularily touched me:

"If you really want to STOP knowing someone, you have to divorce him."
--how true! The man I thought I knew for 20+ yrs quickly became a complete stranger to me in the whole divorce process!

"When I get lonely these days, I think: So BE lonely. Learn your way around loneliness. Make a map of it. Sit with it, for once in your life. Welcome to the human experiene. But never again use another person's body or emotions as a scratching post for your own unfulfilled yearnings."

We all get lonely...but most of us will do anything to stiffle that feeling, to get away from it...even use someone else for our own short term needs. Buddhist teachings and meditation have helped me to be able to be able to stay with the feelings I am experiencing. I am learning to acknowledge the feelings, stay with them and avoid reaction. Its incredibly difficult to do!!

"Devotion is diligence without assurance. Faith is acceptance and embracement of what we are presently incapable of understanding. Divinity is a mighty jump from the rational to the inknowable."

...without these, how could we cope with the darkness that is so prevailent in our society??

"But there was something mildly thrilling for me about realizing that in my 34 yrs on earth I have NEVER not slapped at a mosquito when it was biting me. I've been a puppet to this and to millions of other small and large signals of pain or pleasure thru out my life. Whenever something happens, I ALWAYS react. But here I was-disregarding the reflex. A small thing, granted, but how often do I get to say that? And what will I be able to do tomorrow that I cannot yet do today? I counted about 20 mosquito bites. But within a half an hour, all the bites had diminished. It all goes away. Eventually, everything goes away."

I am a reactionary person. Something angers me, I react. Something appears unjust, I react. Something makes me happy, I react. The hardest lesson and the one I am working on the most is reactionism. Having to think...is this thing, situation, person that so pisses me off REALLY worth all this?? Is this going to make a difference in my life today, tomorrow and 5 yrs from now? Is the position I take now going to help me/my family or hurt us? Will this really matter?
Sometimes the BEST thing to do is to laugh and just let it go....

"Destiny, I feel, is also a relationship-a play between divine grace and willful self-effort. Half of it you have no control over; half of it is absolutely in your hands, and your actions will show measurable consequence. We gallop through our lives like circus performers balancing on two speeding side-by-side horses--one foot is on the horse called "fate", the other on the horse called "free will". Which horse do I need to stop worrying about because it's not under my control, and which do I need to steer with concentrated effort?"

We have so little control over what happens in our lives and in this world. We true only have control over 1 thing...our choices. We don't have control over our children, our spouses or partners, our jobs, our surroundings. This was a very, very difficult lesson for me to learn. I always felt I was in control of everything. My kids, my marriage, my friends, my life!! That one blew up in my face. My kids have their own minds. I can steer them in the right direction, especially when they are little, but as they grow up, they must choose for themselves. I am not in control, nor am I responsible for, any of their choices. I cannot MAKE my now ex-husband straighten up and fly right and realize the "wrongness" of choosing divorce over counselling and working on rebuilding our relationship and rebuilding our family (and today, I wouldn't want that decision either). I can't make my friend see that her choice isn't a good one...she must live out the consequences of that choice. All I CAN do is be here, love her and help pick up the pieces when things fall apart.... just like she did for me.

Every decision we make and act that we take has a ripple effect on everyone around us and their choices create a history and ripple through everyone around them...we think we can predict events and outcomes cause we think we know someone else SO well!!! Well, let me tell ya...from knowing someone SOOO well, it ain't so! They will do something you NEVER, EVER expected and your life and everyone's around you will be changed forever... The prospect of "being in control" is frankly---an illusion.

Read the book...it will change your life.