I read this book called There is Nothing Wrong with You by Cheri Huber (I talk about it in my last post as well.) She says,
I can give you the simplest of all possible rules of thumb:
Any time a voice is talking to you that is not talking with love and compassion, DON’T BELIEVE IT!
Even if it’s talking about someone else, don’t believe it.
I’ve been experimenting with applying this and I think my head is becoming a happier place to be.
All I do is this:
If I notice a thought that is not compassionate, I say to myself, “You can think that, but I don’t have to believe it.” Its very freeing and the interesting thing is, often, when I say I don’t have to believe it, it’s not just an exercise, I find that I really don’t believe it!
Example: I was walking with a friend. She asked a couple if they knew what time it was. They didn’t look down at their wrists, the woman just looked at my friend, laughed and said, in what I thought was a snotty voice “NO.” “Bitch.” I thought. “You can say she’s a bitch, but I don’t have to believe it.” I said back to myself. I relaxed, the indignance went away. I realized, I don’t think she’s a bitch. She’s just a person.
When I write that out, it sounds simplistic to me. I mean, I can imagine arguing with that, “Yeah, maybe someone acting in what you thought was a snotty way in one moment in time doesn’t need to have the overall label of “bitch” applied to her, but there are evil people in the world.” Oh wow, my mind has really gotten into this habit, “You can think that, but I don’t have to believe it.” It says right back.
And you know, once again, I think that voice is right. There are just people. We all have dark sides to us. We all have deep angers, deep fears. Who knows what we would do in certain circumstances? Some people, it’s true, have a pattern of actions that does not make them safe to be around. I want them locked away until they can act in a manner that does not harm others. But I don’t want them to be tortured or hurt. I hope the best for them. I know we can all act darkly and I’ve had a different life, and different choices that have led me to not want to hurt people.
I have a lot of thoughts that aren’t the most compassionate on the planet about myself as well:
I want to go out and have fun. “No one is going to like you until you lose weight, so, lose weight and then go meet people.” “You can think that, but I don’t have to believe it.” says me right back to myself.
Wow, when I don’t believe that, guess how much enthusiasm to go out and do something fun suddenly bubbles up? In the past few days, I’ve gone from wondering how to meet people to having a flood of old interests come back into my brain. Suddenly there are so many things I want to do. So many ways to have really interesting and wholesome fun all around me. “You better lose weight first, get yourself together first, look perfect first…” “You can go ahead and think that, but I don’t have to believe it.” Says the girl who went salsa dancing last night and had a great time, says me right back to me.
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