Saving Ourselves

by Eduardo del Buey

Saving Ourselves

“What lies behind you and what lies in front of you, pales in comparison to what lies inside of you”.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

For the past few months, some readers have expressed concern for what is occurring globally, the stress they are feeling at having to deal with their own reactions to events around the world, and the challenge of maintaining a positive vision of their future.

I can empathize with them.

For the past few months, I have also grown weary of sharing conclusions in articles that serve to underscore the challenges facing us, with little insight as to how to manage them.

I would like to share two ways I have found to deal with the stress.

The first deals with the reality within ourselves.

We can learn to avoid having events outside of our lives perturb our inner peace. To do so requires strengthening ourselves mentally and spiritually to avoid personalizing every outside development that causes us concern.

One key element is to understand that empathy can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it enables us to feel another’s pain which can motivate us to help them. On the other hand, we can risk absorbing too much of another’s pain and wind up suffering ourselves.

Another element is to pursue emotional balance.

There are many ways of achieving this.

Some find it through organized religion and the community it provides. Communing with fellow believers in churches or temples and adhering to a theological pattern of introspection can produce beneficial results.

Others find it by listening to music which can resonate with good memories to help create a feeling of peace, reduce stress, and allow you to adopt a different emotional reaction with respect to events beyond your control.

A visit to a quiet museum or gallery can also reduce our stress, and the beauty of art can help create a positive feeling. As Friedrich Nietzsche once said, art exists so that we do not “die of the truth”.

Enjoying cultural activities as well as exercising and watching or participating in sports can produce endorphins that reduce the stresses brought on by everyday life with the added benefit of enhance your quality of life.

Our bodies and minds are holistic entities that together react to stimuli and produce emotional well-being.

Another way of controlling our reactions to outside events is by taking a spiritual path.

Those who engage in spiritualism see the universe as one, with the creative force of the universe (which many call God) being at our center with our intuition connecting us.

The connection can be achieved through various meditative practices used by Eastern and Western mainstream religions and from the spiritual practices of indigenous peoples around the world.

Spiritualism is my preferred path, as described in two books I recently published, “One Man’s Quest” and “Achieving Universal Consciousness”, both available at Amazon.com.

However, each person has their own path.

I do not claim that my way or any way is better.

We all have our own journey through life, and both books describe mine. But they may also help you discover tools to explore your own personal path to spiritual and emotional strength.

I have learned that strengthening ourselves emotionally and spiritually can help us better manage our reactions to outside events. From there, we can explore ways in which we can make a difference – small or large as it may be.

We can review daily routines such as our use of social media and how to use it to obtain different points of view. Think about what you post and share: is it necessary, is it negative or positive?

What we share can affect others, and we must be conscious of this fact in using social media.

Participation and volunteering in community activities can also play a positive role in our lives. Cultural events can nourish the soul, and we can participate or even volunteer to make them happen.

In the realm of politics and civic service, we can seek and support leaders who seek unity and social harmony. We can also participate in seminars and conferences that bring people together to deal with one or more causes that concern us.

We can use the power of our wallets to support those media and entertainment organizations that sustain our beliefs and values without a negative agenda.

We can also enjoy the sense of purpose that accompanies being kind to others and helping them in ways that do not deplete our own peace of mind.

In addition, we can share our positive vision through our writing and sharing our findings with others, learning from them as we hone our intuition and judiciously enhance our own path.

Substack and other social media are valuable tools that allow us to initiate and share dialogue with others, creating a communal consciousness that can grow and providing others with a more positive outlook on life.

This has been my tool of choice, allowing me to dialogue with readers to understand what makes them tick while learning from them and expanding my own knowledge of the human experience.

The important thing is that we can be in a better place to deal with issues and events when we are emotionally strong. This also facilitates our ability to act and engage our intuition to guide us in the direction that most reflects our values, to achieve our goals.

Retreating into a shell from the challenges we face is not an option if we wish to feel that we are in control of our destiny.

Strengthen within and strengthen without should be our mantra, and our roadmap to making a difference.

Find your own way to achieve your goals.

Remember, it is not the actions of others but our reaction that impacts our emotional well-being.

You may not be able to change THE world, but you can change YOUR world.

And what a difference that can make.

http://www.eduardodelbuey.com