Human beings have the common goal of achieving happiness within their life. Most people may equate success to the emotion of happiness meaning, if they’re not successful they won’t be happy. Everyone will have a different idea of what success means to them. However, when it comes to happiness, I have learned that happiness is inner peace. What this means is it’s safe to eliminate the idea or perception of what society defines happiness to be simply because society teaches us to equate happiness to things that are monetary or materialistic. Elisabeth Kubler Ros said, “there are only two emotions: love and fear.” Joy, happiness, acceptance, compassion, etc., are all derivatives of love. While the emotions of jealousy, guilt, shame, anxiety, anger, depression are the derivatives of fear. It’s both necessary and important to make decisions out of love and not fear because fear is a protective emotion. Even though the fear-based mind has helped humans through evolution and living through some of the toughest times, the fear-based mindset only helps us in survival. It is the love-based mindset that will help us grow and prosper. Here’s a basic scenario, let’s say you have a friend who verbally insults you or attacks you through verbal abuse. If you respond from a fear-based mind you may act protective or respond through aggression or impulse. When you do this you’re making decisions based on scarcity, ego, and insecurities. Yet on the contrary, if you were to respond from a love-based mind, you could practice a moment of stillness or mindfulness. If you decide to respond with love, you will show compassion and kindness to your friend. So how do we work on becoming aware of choosing love over fear? True growth comes from how quickly you’re able to shift and navigate from a fear-based mind to a love-based mind. So here’s a step by step guide of how to shift your mind:
- Recognize the thought (the only way to get better is to admit and recognize that YOU have a true problem). (Why am I feeling this? Why did I make that decision? Why did I say that?)
- Forgive yourself (this is the most important step. Be gentle with yourself, your imperfections, your past, and negative patterns associated with your past). (You can forgive yourself by being grateful for your thoughts that no longer serve your purpose and embrace what you have to look forward to since you know what you don’t want).
- Choose again (what’s the best feeling or thought for me to have right now?) (This is sometimes very difficult to do so creating your affirmation and saying it aloud helps you see the feeling or thought through to the end.
All in all, hanging on to any emotion causes suffering. Even chasing emotions causes one to attract suffering their way. One must remember that love and fear are both impermanent. When you remember this you avoid suffering. Choose love over fear while making decisions or responding to someone, because holding on to any emotion will only bring suffering in life.
