Absense

Life is beautiful and always interesting and a source of learning opprtunities, new experiences and excitement.

Before you tell me I live in a dream world, let me give you some examples.

1. Is there darkness? 

Darkness  does not exist. Darkness  is just the absense of light. At the infinite extreme there is a place where there is no light. From there onwards we can just add light. How do we make it darker in a room for example? We limit light from entering.

2. Is ther such a thing as cold?

Again the answer is no. There is just absense of heat. At zero degrees Kelvin there is absolutely no heat. How do we make it colder, we take away the heat or suck it out. How does an air conditioner work? It takes the heat out of the media and then blows wind over the 'cold'

3. Evil? Bad?

The absense of good.

We can go through all the good attributes too. Greed is the absense of sharing. Hate is the absense if love, jealousy is the absense of trust. And we can go on. 

Where am I going with this? Just this, there is always a bright side, positive outcome, don't dwell on the lack, look for the abundance.

When we are dealing with people, look for the good, the kindness, etc. it is there and maybe it is up to you to add the 'light' in their 'darkness' the warmth in their cold, the good to their bad. Even in your own life you can make it better by concentrating on the 'good' rather than the 'bad'. Then, be grateful for it rather than blaming the absence of it.

Glass half full

Someone asked me the other day if I was a glass half full or half empty guy and my reply was neither. I am an engineer and believes the glass has not been designed properly so that it will always be full!

This may sound like a witty answer and it is but the more I thought about it? The more I realized that there may just be something true about it. 

Why should we be stuck with the same glass and measure everything against it if we can change the glass to fit the amount of water or whatever liquid you have in the glass? Then we will always have a glass full. Makes more sense doesn't it?

Ahh, but you ask how we do that? 

Let me relate another story I heard. If I look at my life right at this moment, this second, then I have exactly what I need. I have a place to stay, food to eat, work to do, family and friends who love and care for me, I am healthy, have talents that I am using, and I can go on counting all my blessings at this moment. 

I am also exactly where I am supposed to be. That's right. If I was supposed to be somewhere else I would have been there but I am not. 

Also, I  am exactly who I am supposed to be at this moment. I cannot be someone else right now can I? Or be different. I am what I am, now. 

So with all this information at my  fingertips, the glass size actually fits me at this moment and it is full. Amazing isn't it? To the rim. I should be content. 

So why do we have this glass half empty thing? Why are we not content with the situation right now? I think it is because we are not living in the moment. We are either living in the past with lots of regrets or unfinished business making our glass emptying out or half empty, or in the future with dreams and goals that we want to achieve to make us happy making the glass half full. Both of which keeps us from being content with what we have right now and the glass always feels to be emptying or filling but never full. 

But that cannot be right? I have all these things in my past that is bothering me. That I have to sort out! That little voice that tells me I should have.... You know what, at last, at last, the past is past. I cannot change it. Learn from it, make amends but put it where it belongs, in the past. 

Or what about the dreams and goals? It's in the future and not certain. Remember, contentment does not equal

complacency. I should have the dreams and goals but they should not be what determines my happiness at this moment. Happiness is a choice not an achievement. 

Moral of the story? Live in the moment , look around, count your blessings and redesign your glass so that it it always full. 

The Doors of Life

"If one door closes, another opens."

Doors are an interesting metaphor. And we use it so often that it has sort of lost its message. I have been thinking about this.

Doors have been invented so we can walk though walls. Clever, don't you think? No-one builds a room with no doors. If it has no doors it is not a room anymore. No doors - nothing very interesting inside! 

I Could not really get this metaphor. What happens if I am inside the room and the door closes? Does it mean I am trapped in a room where I maybe don't want to be? Plus I will not be able to open the door  that supposedly will open for me. Unless it means I have to open the door that closed to first get out of the room! Just a funny way to look at it.

Now, this whole metaphor works better if 'I' close a door. This will imply that I have decided that the room does not hold anything for me anymore or it is holding something that I don't want to be with or experience. Or I just want to get out of the room and don't want to return. (Obviously, then I have to open the door first before I can close it or it has to be open to start with)

Next, once I have closed a door, I must look for other doors. Just looking for other doors is not very interesting. Looking at a closed door does not tell me what it is hiding, (unless there is a sign on it).

Plus, to find out what lies behind, I have to try a door to see if it is open. If I don't try, firstly I  would not know if it is open, won't I?

When you find an open door, you have to actually open the door to see what is there. Then you have to go into the room to experience what the room has to offer. Just going around opening doors will be very unfulfilling. You get a glimpse of what each room holds but don't experience anything. Like walking around a great buffer dinner setup but not picking anything to eat!

Something else to consider - with a door open, you actually have to move you feet, you won't experience anything by not walking into the room. In other words it will take some more effort from your side. 

There is another side to this metaphor too. Sometimes someone else will close a door for you. You will then have a choice. Accept it and stay in the room hoping someone else will open it and you will like what they are bringing into the room. Or, the open door you are looking for is the one leading out of the room. Interesting, isn't it.

So - maybe the metaphor should read: 

"Sometimes you have to close a door to enable you to find an open door."

Or

"You have to open a door to get out of a closed room."

Or

"Don't judge a room by its door"