Have you ever been in a situation where it seemed justified to act like a horse’s pa-toot? You know, those situations where someone is being completely out-of-line, obnoxious, rude, unkind, insensitive, bullying . . . so much so that you feel justified in being a horse’s pa-toot right back at them. This can be as minor as someone cutting you off in traffic or a full-on battle with a spouse. I’ve had several of these situations come up recently and boy did I want to react in-kind – and no one would have faulted me for it. They deserved it – right?
But then I had to ask myself; who do I want to be in relation to this affront? Do I choose to behave poorly just because the other person started it? How that other person is behaving should not dictate how I behave. I don’t want to react in a way that is defensive and hard-hearted – that’s not who I am and it’s not who I want to be. What’s more important – winning the argument, proving my point or opening my heart and compassionately and passionately being available to this moment – regardless of who someone else is being?
I’ve been working to choose the latter; which is neither effortless nor straightforward. Sometimes I find myself in the thick of my defensive/offensive diatribe before I catch myself. Pause. Breathe. Center. Shift. Who do I want to be in this situation? Certainly not this malevolent shrew! How can I be creatively present and responsive rather than reactive and an obstacle to understanding?
What I’ve discovered in this exploration is that it is never too late to shift gears, backup and take another run at the confrontation – which isn’t to say everything always turns out hunky-dory, it doesn’t. At least I have attempted to bring my best self to the exchange. One of the ways I’ve been successful is to acknowledge, in myself, that there are widely divergent versions of reality at play. If I am convinced that MY reality is THE reality, I will never open my mind and my heart to what is trying to reveal itself through this confrontation. Where these divergent realities intersect, lies a kernel of mutual truth – if I can shift my focus to that point, I have a chance to be taught, to learn, to hear, to be present . . . to access my soulful self. If I tenaciously decide to quit standing on MY point, I can look toward the truth and find a way forward, either within myself or in the situation.
If each of us could, in some way, manage to orient to the innate and soulful self – that in us which is confident, intuitive, caring and has room for the quirks and foibles of being human – perhaps a portal would open and there would be room for each of us to be more inherently and authentically who we are and who we want to be.
