Accepting Things

Accepting Things. Accepting things and doing what you can to move on. Maybe you can change things? Maybe you can’t? That’s how things are?

I’m trying to not get angry over the things that happen in my day, especially the circumstances that I can’t control. Trying not to get riled up over it. I often fail at this one, but I think my stats are improving.

What sets me off? What are the things that put me in a bad mood?

News. There is just so much bad news, all the time. Things never seem to be getting better. From crime and injustice, to wars, the economy and politics. Even the good news is never enough to outweigh the grime of the bad. I have learned that I can’t really change the news, but I can make a difference where I live. At least a little bit of a difference. I get it, but how do I accept that and move on?

Well, not sure I have a real answer here. I mean, I personally start with avoidance, but that only lasts so long because someone else will tell me what’s going on, and if I don’t pay attention I just lost 20% of my savings because of what’s going on in the market. Ouch. Yeah it hurts, but I can’ really do anything about that either, other than get out.

Accepting where I am at, what’s going on, and deciding what to do with my time, that’s big stuff.

Not letting it paralyze me, not letting it depress me, not letting it ruin my time that I have, that’s big stuff.

What something “is”, does not mean that it will always be that way. Right? At the same time, my favorite stock isn’t guaranteed to recover. The company could be gone forever, it happens.
Accepting things for what they are, they are just that, “what they are.” I try to say that “it’s not good, or bad, it just is,” but that doesn’t work for me. Because sometimes it is really bad. I feel it. I get depressed. I feel angry. It makes me want to scream. Losing 25% is bad. War is bad. Crime, injustice, bad bad. So just saying “it just is” doesn’t really work for me.

Well. Breathing helps. Coffee helps. Taking time to think about what I can do next helps. I guess I can accept responsibility for things that I can do, and put myself to work doing them. Like investing in those relationships with friends that are important to me. Like working on my music, like sharing my thoughts on this blog. These are things that I can do.

How about just accepting things as, “Well, that just happened. What do I do?” Some things I cannot control, I just have to let them pass. Let the news run it’s cycle? Watch the world go crazy? Let everyone else go insane? I guess. But some things I can take action on. I should do that. I feel better about things when I take action in a positive way.

How about today? Today I have a big list, I am going to prune it down and make it something I can actually get done today. I am going to procrastinate on a few things I don’t really want to make time for and maybe schedule them for Monday or even later next week. That’s good.

That’s a decision.

Hey maybe that’s the answer? Make a decision to accept what I can do, and what I won’t do, and getting to work on those things? And that’s okay…

I may need to tell myself that “it’s okay” 100 times. Maybe 1000.

I think today is one of those days, no news days. Just prune my to do list, enjoy my cup of coffee, work on the few things that matter to me and people I care about. That would be a good day.

Call some people I love, and do the things that matter? I’ll take that any day.