We used to talk about getting rid of our buttons, taking back our power, or as Wayne Dyer said, "Pulling Your Own Strings." It was a time of understanding our personal responsibility and our power to change our experience of life.
Today, the "woke" crowd screams "I'm triggered," and expects everyone else to change. The despots want to throw tyranny on others, expecting them to jump to their demands and stop triggering them. Irrational, as Dr. Spock would have said.
What I have learned, among other things, is that it is not possible to get everyone else to agree with us 100% or even close to that, to get them to do and be as we say we want, or to control them in any meaningful way.
But, I have learned that we can control ourselves. We can stop being puppets on other people's strings. We can stop giving our power away. We can become responsible for ourselves.
How can we get there, if we are stuck in the powerless position of expecting others to shape up? First, we check our self-talk. What are we saying to ourselves? Is it about how others need to change or about how we need to not be so sensitive, or maybe about how we just need to brush the dust off of our feet and move on? Is our self-talk empowering or disempowering? Does it lead us to magnificence or dependence on the whims of others? If it leads to not-so-good places, change it - reword it.
We need to observe our reactions. I learned a very long time ago that if a particular criticism is invalid, it is not useful and is needless to get upset over it. If it has some validity to it, then we would be foolish to ignore it, as we could improve by heeding it.
If someone states a different opinion than ours, how do we react? Do we get upset? Do we argue or name call or remove them from our life? Or, do we say, that is very interesting, I've not looked at it that way, tell me how you arrived at that? Is there room in our heart for others to see from a different vantage point?
Do we view others as "teachers" or just "other?" Do we view others as spiritual beings having a human experience with all its ups and downs? Or do we judge others, speak negatively about them, and even enjoy their foibles and troubles?
Do we view everyone as a Divine Child of the More, neither greater nor lesser than us? Do we understand the concept of Oneness, of One Creator of us all?
A conscious life takes some work, that is, we have to be engaged in our own inner process. We have to be aware, to correct our own paths, and to rise above the pitfalls of life rather than wallow in them.
This self-responsibility leads to freedom. We are no longer puppets on other people's strings.
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