Peace

Accepting where one is in life is often very difficult. When a person has gone through years of rejection or pain or suffering or loss; then often some resolution happens.

Either the person accepts the place they are at, they make choices to change where they are going, or circumstances change to ease the pain. This, however, does not necessarily mean that the person moves on from the pain.

People sometimes choose to wallow in their suffering for years to come. They have to tell others about the great pain they have been through as if this makes them better than others (note to self, all people suffer, one person's pain does not elevate you above another person). Or perhaps they have to make themselves a martyr/victim by not accepting responsibility for any actions that might have took them to that place of pain or prolong the pain. Or they may stay in that place, deluding themselves that the pain is still there, or they have to continue to make themselves suffer and they don't deserve happiness or peace and the suffering is necessary for some imagined punishment for a crime they have never paid the price for. They may also lash out at others who they perceive as causing them their pain or sorrow and cause years of abuse onto them through what would be described as stalking, abuse, threats, harassment, or even filing frivolous lawsuits to make them 'pay'.

I once heard a woman evangelist talk about this moving on from pain as she was quoting the Biblical scripture, "though you pass through the valley of death, you will fear no evil..."  her remark was that you walk through the valley of death (or pain, sorrow and loss) you do not pull up a chair and stay a while. That really hit a chord with me. I have used that to remind myself to get past the pain that comes into my life. To remember that what I am suffering at that moment is temporary. I remind myself that my actions can prolong my suffering or shorten it.

 Peace is my choice.