These are two very important questions to answer in order to have a life that brings fulfillment.
So much of the time we either spend our lives thinking of our past with feelings of hurt, resentment and regret, which leads to feelings of depression, or we spend our time thinking of our future with worry and fear, which leads to feelings of anxiety.
And when we are not doing either of these, we are usually in the pursuit of something that will bring us momentary pleasure and escape.
In order to experience the joy in our lives, we need to experience our lives.
This means to understand that there is a difference between our life situation and our life.
Another way of saying this is, that it’s not what happens in our lives that is the determining factor, but rather what we do with what is happening in our lives and how we respond to it.
This is a very important concept and one that most of us have a difficult time accepting. We want to believe that it’s outside factors, either life circumstances or other people that determine our feelings.
When we believe this, we end up reacting to these factors instead of being able to respond. Our reactions tend to make us act like we are either ready to fight or to take flight.
A different approach is to accept what is happening in the moment. Most of us don’t want to do this.
We want to tell ourselves that this shouldn’t be happening, this should be different, this isn’t fair and a variety of other ways of not experiencing what is.
Most of the time, this is related to something we have no control over making it any different than what it is.
We think that accepting what is will end up with us feeling powerless, and in a certain kind of way this is true.
There are things in our lives that we are powerless to change. Yet it’s in accepting this powerlessness that we find our true power.
Our true power lies in our ability to respond, to decide what we want to do about what we are experiencing.
So, the next time you find yourself complaining, upset or fearful, stop and ask yourself two very important questions: What do I have control over in this situation? And, what don’t I have control over?
Then spend your time focusing on what you do have control over and put your time and effort in doing what you can about that.
The part that you can see that you don’t have control over, practice telling yourself to let go of that, to stop putting your focus on something that will only result in your feeling either depressed or anxious.
These are two essential steps in being able to answer, YES, I do enjoy my life and I do live my life in joy!