FIND YOUR HAPPY: An Inspirational Guide to Loving Life to Its Fullest by Shannon Kaiser Read Free Book Online

occurs, we cause even more ripples of frustration, anger, and resentment. This chapter is about letting situations happen in life without reacting to them. When we detach from the emotional aspect of events that happen in life, we can have a more balanced perspective that will help us make more rational and focused choices.
    I can speak from personal experience about the power of balance and keeping emotions in check. I was the person who reacted to everything (and I still catch myself doing this). When I was six years old, my older brother was babysitting me and he told me it was time to go to bed. I looked at him, slammed my foot into the ground and said, “NO.” He gave me a few more minutes. About ten minutes later, he said, “Okay, now it is time go to bed.” I yelled, “No!” Naturally, as the big brother, he sensed I might be taking advantage of him and he got stern with me. I didn’t like that one bit. After turning profusely red, I started to cry and scream. My body became tingly with overwhelming emotions of anger, frustration, worry, and fear . . . all because I didn’t want to go to bed.
    Even as a young girl my stubborn personality trait was evident. I was not one to do anything I didn’t want to do, and it was indeed my way, or the highway. I had worked myself up into such a frenzy that my brother began to worry. He watched my flushed red face puff up from the waterworks. I choked on my own tears. My body started to shake. He didn’t know what to do to get me to stop, so he put a towel around me and hugged me. He put his body weight onto me to get me to calm down. He was trying to let me know I was loved. But the shock of my big brother lying on top of me was so shocking that I started to scream even louder and declare, “I am NOT going to bed!”
    Each emotion fed off the next, like a lion attacking its innocent prey. Worry turned into fear, fear turned into anger, and so on. At this point I was just a body in the scene—Shannon had stepped out temporarily. The emotions were so strong that my rational loving heart was nowhere to be found. I was a wet, hot mess consumed with fear and tears of rage. Talk about being a drama queen . . . all of this because I didn’t want to go to bed.
    Eventually my brother learned to back away and let my emotions take their course. I had to process all of them before I could get to a place of peace. Getting to peace is a scary process if we are afraid to look at our emotions. How many times have emotions taken over and gotten the best of you? It is a guarantee that dramas will come in and out of our lives forever, but it is how we work through each situation that determines success in life. When we can feel our emotions we are able to let go of the hold they take over us. It is when we run from them and choose not to acknowledge them that our lives feel chaotic and stressed.
    Simply sit with the feeling and say, “Okay, I feel stressed right now. Okay, stress, I see you. Let me move through you.” When we hold on to emotions and don’t process them, they turn into larger problems, sometimes even disease. It is important to be one with our emotions and stop blaming others for our unhappiness. We have the power to be happy. We choose. In every given moment you can choose a happy or sad thought. Only you have the power to be fulfilled and satisfied. It starts with a happy thought. We cannot blame the world for what happens to us. I understand that some pretty nasty things take place, but our thoughts govern our responses to the events in our world. We must take responsibility; whether we like it or not, we have asked for every single thing in our lives. If we do not like it, it is up to us to change it.
    Release Resentment
    Life is really short. The older we get, the more experience, knowledge, and wisdom we collect, and the shorter it feels. We will not be on our deathbed thinking about the toys we bought or the fancy cars we went into debt to buy. It will be