Think Results NOW: You Are What You Think book 1

You Are What You Think book 1

Article #19

My life is an Excellent Adventure from using “You Are What You Think”

Keep Your Channels Open

MANY TIMES I have heard people say, “Good things never seem to happen to me.”

Everyone has channels for good to flow through, but what good is a channel if it becomes clogged ? Often it is our resentments, and inability to forgive, that do the clogging and block the flow.

The person who is full of resentment is blocking the flow of any good that might come to him or her. It is like putting a tourniquet around your arm to stop the flow of blood.

WE RESENT the way people around us are acting. We become resentful of the annoyances that are continually upsetting us.

Please think about the following the next time you are upset and unhappy;

Are you really upset because of what happened ? Isn’t it more truthful to say that you are upset because it didn’t coincide with what YOU wanted to happen ?

ARE YOU UPSET because of the way someone acted ? Are you sure it isn’t because the person didn’t act the way YOU thought he or she should have acted ?

It is our preconceived ideas of what we think should happen that cause resentment. Who are we to put our ideas upon others ? It we could eliminate these preconceived ideas we would rid ourselves of much of our unhappiness.

Each time we perform an act we automatically expect certain things to happen as a result. This way we expose ourselves to becoming unhappy and upset, which leads to resentment.

AS AN EXAMPLE, we do a favor for someone. If the person doesn’t thank us, we resent it. Or we do what we believe to be an extra good job, but it goes unnoticed.

If we could only do as suggested by the ancient sages in a previous column; Do whatever we do for the joy of doing it without concern for praise or blame. Then our happiness wouldn’t be dependent upon the reactions of others !

Why do we lay ourselves open to being disappointed ?

IF WE ARE RESENTFUL of our environment or our circumstances, nothing is likely to change.

This is one point I constantly drive home to the convicts I meet with at Folsom Prison. A prison is full of hatred and resentment. However, the moment the convict is able to rid himself of feelings of hatred and resentment, he becomes out of place in that environment, and is soon released. Up to this point, about 98 per cent of the ones I have known have stayed out.

This is probably because they have discovered that their feelings of well being and peace of mind are not dependent on anything or anyone outside themselves.

THE MOMENT they get even an inkling of the control they have over their lives they gain an inner confidence.

They no longer feel resentment because they realize there is really nothing to resent !

Perhaps you have been resenting your surroundings and even some of those persons close to you. You would like some changes buy don’t know how to go about it.

THE CHANGE MUST COME from within yourself ! Change your own attitude and everything else will follow. It will happen so fast it will seem like a miracle !

If things have not been going well for you, make sure there is not someone whom you have yet to forgive. Search yourself and see if you are holding a grudge, (it may be camouflaged in some self-righteous way) against some individual, or some movement of which you disapprove.

It could be you are still resentful of something that happened to you as a child. Or some real, or imagined wrong that happened long ago.

IF ANY OF THIS is true, you have an act of forgiveness to perform. If you can’t forgive, don’t expect things to improve for you.

When you set others free by forgiving you are setting yourself free also. Did you ever think of resentment as being a form of attachment ?

It takes two to make a prisoner; the prisoner and the jailer. You couldn’t be a prisoner unless someone else were involved.

ACCORDING TO the mystics, when you hold resentment against anyone, you are bound to that person by a cosmic link. Although it is a mental chain, it is real.

You are attaching yourself to the one person in the world you probably dislike the most ! Surely that is not what you want. Always remember you belong to that with which you are linked in thought.

You must cut all such ties by an act of forgiveness. Through forgiveness you become free of all resentments, and set yourself free.