Everything in life is a balance, everything has an opposite. When fixing yourself and your soul you need to understand and embrace that fact.

When you look at life, everything in life, there is always a natural balance within the system; the good and the bad, the strong and the week. It is impossible to know one without the the other. You cannot know up without down, hot without cold, good without evil, positive without negative, left without right, joy without sorrow, love without hate.

Take a few moments and think about it! Everything has an opposite and if there were not opposites how could you know or have a reference to anything? There could be no up without down it would just be there! There could be no positive without negative it would just be!

So why am I writing about this today and how does it apply to you?

Because…

A few months ago this started coming up quite frequently and I had to put my thoughts down about it and share it with whoever I can. Some of the people I know seem to be struggling and have really been on a war path. They have been rude, mean, cruel and downright bad to some of the people they know. I have had the personal pleasure to have them say some really nasty things to me, call me some pretty bad names. Of course this always gets me thinking as do really enjoy people, the things we do, why we do them and how they shape and mold our lives.

So, here is a quick story about a situation that came up. It shows some perspective and opposites and how they applied to me at the time.

A while back I was doing group therapy with my ex-wife and daughter, one of the therapist said to me “that must really make you upset”, and “it must be hard not talking to people, feeling like you do not have support, and are on your own.”

I thought it was very curious he said this and I responded “no, not really”. He said that same thing a couple of times and I did not really think about why he would keep pushing that topic. As I kept talking it dawned on me… He was assuming that I was upset and could not cope with what was said. I started to feel quite a few different emotions, joy, sorrow, and a lot of empathy.

I felt the joy for myself… I was truly good with everything that was said and even the fact that the therapist had repeatedly tried to infer that it must be really hard for me. I had already come to terms with the good, the bad, the joy, the sorrow, all of it. And when you realize that you cannot have one without the other and you embrace that you are everything the good and the bad, the strong and the week, then you are really free. I was joyful that I could be there, be put into a bad situation and be accepting of what is in front of me, be accepting that other people can be on a completely different page/path, yet still be accepting with myself.

As I thought more about the situation and the therapists responses and how people came to me afterwards and said it will get better, we understand that it is a hard situation and it would be hard to deal with, I started to feel that sadness and empathy. It seemed that some of the other people had a bigger reaction and emotional strain on the situation than I did. While I was very grateful that they showed support and I truly appreciate the that, it started to make me think of how, as people, we try not to see all the sides and we do not see that everything has an opposite. For a lot of people this is habit, years of teaching ourselves to see the good and only the good. But this isn’t the right approach. There is most certainly a negative side at times and to pretend there isn’t is to not embrace the totality of the life we all live.

This got me thinking about why the natural tendency would be to feel sorry and have pity for yourself. But pity and feeling sorry will not get you anywhere, and when you realize that you are and are not, then you start to have the ability to be accepting to all things around you. You can truly be free and accepting of you and your life. The feelings you end up with are that of compassion for others and acceptance and joy for yourself. Knowing that I felt compassion and empathy for others and myself led me to feel the sorrow for those who have not had this realization yet, the realization that we are everything and nothing and that everything has an opposite.

All of this leads me to this point…

It is not about not feeling or being one thing, telling yourself that it is good or positive, or that you are great. It is about realizing that everything has an opposite and there cannot be the good without the bad. It is about realizing that you are everything, that you can feel all feelings, and that only when you truly accept that fact can you be at peace with yourself.

You have to look inside see every part of you, especially the bad parts. You need to look at those parts and embrace and accept them. Once you do this you will be able to grow and change.

When you understand that life is a balance and everything has an opposite you can begin to appreciate the negative for the simple fact that it allows you to be conscious of the positive. And if you take it one step further you then can understand how you can enjoy the the positive because of the lack of enjoyment of the negative.

So, what can you do with this? Take some time every day, go to a quite space and just think about it. Think about who you are and the things you do. Realize that you are everything, that everything has an opposite, and that you get to choose what you will do! You get to be who you want because of the choice!

That is the hardest part, looking at yourself and realizing that you are a little bit of everything. It is easy to look at yourself and say how great you are and we all do it regularly because we do not like the pain of believing we are anything but good. It is hard to look at yourself and say I am screwed up here, I not good here, I failed here. We don’t like to see that about ourselves, we like the easy path, the one that affirms that we are good and have a high moral standard and are better than the next person. It is painful for someone to tell you something about you that you don’t like, it can be even more painful to tell yourself. But you don’t have to stay that person, you don’t have to let your negative qualities rule you.

The only way to fix your life and make it what you want is to fix yourself! You have to fix what’s inside to become who you want to be and to truly be free in everything you do. You have to accept who you are, all of it, every side! And when you embrace that everything has an opposite you then became capable of seeing the beauty in that which can cause us pain. You become whole, no longer fight yourself and can embrace the beauty in the totality of your life.