Do you affect life or does life affect you?
It’s a complex combination that cannot be denied. We want to think that our willpower can control the universe and we know that it cannot. Failing that, we try to force thinking positive to overcome our situation. When that does not work either, we find ourselves in our real place. Our real place is the present. We can work very hard and have enormous wealth, or we can do nothing special and have enormous wealth. We can work at nothing and lose everything; we can work hard at everything and achieve nothing. All of these things can happen. We cannot say that we are in control. We can increase our comfort and even our pleasure, but we cannot say how others will treat us, or how destiny will define us.
Victor Frankl made the observation (and in fact, had the experience) that in spite of a terrible and traumatic life situation, one can be true to self and hang onto one’s own free will of experience. He met every day in the nazi prison with self determination to continue to be a good person. Because he felt a purpose in living, he was able to survive unthinkable hardships. Often, he was surrounded by other prisoners who cared for and supported each other; they did this by denying their captors the right to make them hurtful or hateful. Their captors were capable of horrifying atrocities, but the majority of the prisoners avoided the hatred that would make them cruel to each other, they chose nurturing and caring for each other over the hate.
We want there to be an equation to life, yet, there is no such equation. There is no reason for how life works out. There is no equity and obviously no objective justice. What can humans do? As Eckhardt Tolle suggests, we must gain agreement with ourselves for acceptance of this moment. There are bad situations and negative / hurtful humans around us, we cannot deny these facts. We must have what we have, which is not always what we wish to have, or have worked to have.
