The Mastery of Life Blog

Each person has opinions about how life should be and the way things are. These opinions can be very different. They can also be very helpful. Different opinions can be a source of new ideas and possibility. The problem comes when we try to force our opinions on someone else.

We tend to attack any opinion that conflicts with our own. This is especially true if the opinion is perceived as a threat. To avoid this threat, we fight what the person is saying. We think that this will somehow change the person’s point of view, but it doesn’t.

Fighting a point of view doesn’t make it go away. Fighting a point of view gives it more power. It also makes the person defensive and forces the person to fight back. Then we get upset and fight the person even more. Without knowing, we create a cycle of conflict that brings out the worst in everyone.
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Life doesn’t just happen. We literally create our lives. We interact with life in a very specific way which produces a very specific result. This is why each person’s life is so different. When you discover why your life is the way it is, you become more able to determine how your life will be. These 15 bullet points will provide valuable insight into your life.

1. The problem areas of life are not the problem
If you have a relationship or any other area of life that isn’t working, there will always be an underlying condition of resisting or hanging on. This makes you defensive and destroys your ability to see clearly. It keeps you from finding solutions and forces you to act in a way that magnifies the problem.

2. We fight the truth
At any moment, the people in your life are the way that they are. The circumstances of your life are the way that they are and you are the way that you are. Everything may change tomorrow, but at any moment, what’s so is always what’s so. The areas of your life that don’t work are areas where you are fighting the truth.
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For most of us, the holidays are so full of activities and requirements that we can no longer live our lives the same way. The distractions and influences are so powerful, they pull us out of our reality.

Eventually the holidays end and we go back to our normal lives, but now something is different. Our reality has been disrupted and is a little unsettled. This creates an opportunity to change both our reality and our lives. This opportunity for change gets magnified by the fact that we are entering a new year.

I had a profound experience a few days ago that I want to share with you. I woke up discouraged. It seemed like my life’s work was over and there was nothing I could do about it. I was negative and my thoughts seemed to be the absolute truth of the universe.

Then I noticed that I was having an emotion called “being discouraged.” This was just a feeling and nothing more than a body sensation. To release this negative emotion, I dove into it and felt it deliberately and purposefully. I magnified the feeling and exaggerated it.

Then, in about 15 seconds, the emotion released and I experienced a wonderful freedom. I was amazed at how fast I was able to restore my inner peace. One moment I was caught up in the circumstances and life was painful. In the next moment, I was back in the light and life was a joy.
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I recently had a session with a husband and wife that were deep in the process of a contested divorce. Each had their point of view about how things should be handled and each person’s point of view was valid. As they fought to have their points of view prevail, the cycle of conflict escalated dramatically.

There was so much upset and defensiveness that neither person could hear what the other was saying. Instead of looking for solutions, all the focus was on fighting and resisting. They couldn’t see that the conflict and suffering was their own creation. It was a symptom, not the problem.
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