I haven’t always been a positive person in my life. In high school and junior high school I was nice to people around me, but deep down I felt like the world itself was a place of chaos. I felt that in order to survive in a chaotic world, I needed to embrace chaos itself. I didn’t truly trust other people. I only trusted myself. I felt like I knew something special about how the world worked because I accepted the fact that everyone was out for themselves, and the people who weren’t out for themselves were nice, but they were kind of chumps. I had an attitude of, “That’s great that you’re nice and you sacrifice yourself for others… That’s one less thing that I have to do now.”
But is this outlook on the world actually how the system really works? By system I mean, the system by which people interact and have potential to prosper. The answer lies in one question, “What do you really want?” If you want to live in a system of chaos, the system will appear that way to you. Your desires shape the system by which you live. It’s not the other way around. This may seem strange at first because we are taught in school to imagine civilization as a force that brings order to the world. And without it, we would live in the opposite, which is savagery. But the fact of the matter is that if you are reading this, you haven’t known true savage existence in your life. Sure you may have been on a camping trip, or you may be an extreme sports hero or you may be one of those outdoor survival types. But for the most part, after everything is said and done, we can come back to a world of civilization and order after stints of chaotic episodes. But does that mean we perceive the world to be this way? Many of us perceive the world to be chaotic because we see things relatively. School and work and family seem to float over us in a blur of confusion and responsibility. And we compare these busy schedules to the small amount of free time that we really have and we say, “Life lately has been chaotic.”
Well I say, life can be tranquil, peaceful and full of kindness. And that kindness can cause opportunities to sprout like beans and little sprouts in a hydroponic garden! One of the first ways to make life tranquil is to learn to accept things and fight less. This in no way means to give up in life. What I mean is to take a stance in life that if we were to liken it to a fighting style would be more like Aikido than Boxing. Use the energy of life to your advantage. In Boxing, you have to keep your guard up and block hits and counter attack and be really strong in order to overcome your opponent. (Let’s say that your opponent represents problems and complications in life.) But in Aikido you use movement to parry and redirect the energy of the attacks from your opponent. How how can you redirect problems in life to lean toward tranquility. The answer is that you need to change your perspective on things. If you find yourself getting frustrated then instead of swearing all the time, try and find the source of the frustration and then learn from it. Once you learn from your frustration then adjust your perspective. If you can’t change what’s frustrating you right now, then look at the situation differently in order to save, what I call, “Precious Mind Resources.” For example I was in Los Angeles over Haloween trying to find a place to park so I could go to a party with a good friend. LA was packed with cars and there were cops everywhere and there was honking and overall it wasn’t the best time to drive. Not to mention I don’t like traffic so it was double trouble for me. Well, I started to get really frustrated when I couldn’t find any parking. And when I started to make wrong turns into the part of town where you go up the hill to the houses overlooking the city, I was just like “WAAAA! Get me out of here.” Then I thought I could turn right to get where I needed to go, but it was a dead end into a gated community and I was like, “GRRRR!” I was starting to waste time and I was beginning to fear that’d I hit my car or miss the party entirely. So the first thing I did was identify the source of my frustration, which was being in traffic. Then I learned from it and said, “Ok. I know I’m not the best LA driver. I need to find somewhere to park fast.” Then I changed my perspective and said, “You know what. I don’t think I’m going to find anywhere to park anytime soon. I’ll just park at that pay parking area and cough up the $20 bucks!” My friend was dissappointed and felt like we could have found something if we kept looking but my new perspective was, “He can think I’m a driving wimp all he wants, at least I didn’t get into an accident. And now I can enjoy myself at the party.” Take special not of the “enjoy myself at the party,” part. It is important. The reason why it’s important is because it symbolizes the “Precious Mind Resources” that I was talking about earlier.
Thanks for reading Kindness Multiplies and can cause Opportunity PART 1
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