I smile, a lot. When I was in the army others asked me why I smiled so much. I even had 2 people tell me I needed to be tested for drug use. What I told them was that there were 2 choices, to be here and be happy or to be here and to be mad. Either way, I was going to be there, so I might as well be happy because the only one who suffered would be me. Even that lesson didn't reach the depths of the saying, though. Whether we are right or wrong, unless we are actively engaged in a conversation with someone else it almost never does any good to harbor a grudge. Getting mad about what was done wrong to you just leaves you stewing in your own juices. In other words, you're going to be there regardless. Do you want to be there happy or be there mad?
Several years back I was going through a very rough time with the most important things in my life. While I didn't always make the right choices, what I did uncover in the depth of it all was a simply fact about what matters.
My wife matters, my daughters matter, my faith allows me to build both of those. Other things are less important, but above all I learned the very simple truth of how I need to react to things.
The mantra I began to reiterate inside my head was this:
It doesn't matter that I was wronged, it only matters that I was wrong.
The next time you get mad at someone in traffic, or in the grocery store, try remembering this point. The most important commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself but so often we only remember that we were in the right and they wronged us first. Would you rather be happy or right? It's a state of mind and a choice.
This blog from 22 Feb got me started thinking about this subject http://www.leahadams.org/i-have-not-learned-yet/
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