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The Choice: Embrace the Possible

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Edith Eger

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“Once, an elderly general practitioner consulted me because of his severe depression. He could not overcome the loss of his wife who had died two years before and whom he had loved above all else. Now, how could I help him? What should I tell him? Well, I refrained from telling him anything but instead confronted him with the question, 'What would have happened, Doctor, if you had died first, and your wife would have had to survive you?' 'Oh,' he said, 'for her this would have been terrible; how she would have suffered!' Whereupon I replied, 'You see, Doctor, such a suffering has been spared her, and it was you who have spared her this suffering—to be sure, at the price that now you have to survive and mourn her.' He said no word but shook my hand and calmly left my office. In some way, suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice.”

SufferingSacrificeMeaningMourning
Author:Viktor Frankl
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“And yet. (“and yet” opening like a door.) How easily a life can become a litany of guilt and regret, a song that keeps echoing with the same chorus, with the inability to forgive ourselves. How easily the life we didn't live becomes the only life we prize. How easily we are seduced by the fantasy that we are in control, that we were ever in control, that the things we could or should have done or said have the power, if only we had done or said them, to cure pain, to erase suffering, to vanish loss. How easily we can cling to—worship—the choices we think we could or should have made. Could I have saved my mother? Maybe. And I will live for all of the rest of my life with that possibility. And I can castigate myself for having made the wrong choice. It is my prerogative. Or I can accept that the more important choice is not the one I made when I was hungry and terrified, when we were surrounded by dogs and guns and uncertainty, when I was sixteen; it’s the one I make now. The choice to accept myself as I am: human, imperfect. And the choice to be responsible for my own happiness. To forgive my flaws and reclaim my innocence. To stop asking why I deserved to survive. To function as well as I can, to commit myself to serve others, to do everything in my power to honor my parents, to see to it that they did not die in vain. To do my best, in my limited capacity, so future generations don’t experience what I did. To be useful, to be used up, to survive and to thrive so I can use every moment to make the world a better place. And to finally,finally, stop running from the past. To do everything possible to redeem it, and then let it go. I can make the choice that all of us can make. I can't ever change the past. But there is a life I can save: It is mine. The one I am living right now, this precious moment.”

LifeSufferingChoiceThe PastGuilt For The Past
Book:The Choice: Embrace the Possible
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“There is no way you can fast-forward your Life. When going through painful situations, as long as you are complaining about your circumstances, you will find each day long, dreary and miserable to endure. But when you immerse yourself in what you love doing, you will find that each moment is a celebration. You will then be able to flow with Life, joyously, enthusiastically.”

PainHappinessLife LessonsSufferingAvis ViswanathanFall Like A Rose PetalAvis On HappynessCelebrate LifeThe HappynesswalasThe Bliss Catchers
Author:AVIS Viswanathan
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“Life’s not easy by any means. But it is simple. It surely is not complex. We complicate Life by bringing in our wants, our definitions, and our labels, of how people and events must be. Life’s very simple if we just accept it for the way it is. The journey then will not be any less painful. But there will be no suffering. When you are non-suffering, your Life, despite the circumstances, is a daily celebration of magic, beauty and miracles!”

HappinessLife LessonsSufferingAcceptanceAvis ViswanathanAvis On HappynessThe HappynesswalaNon SufferingFall Like A Rose Petal Pain
Author:AVIS Viswanathan
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