This year has been a year of changes, divisions, and further splitting of people into opposing groups of hopes and beliefs. It seems that the next few years might not necessarily be better, maybe there will be more opportunities, we will see!

I am noticing a lot of struggle with me and a lot of people around me, partly due to the recent ongoing election in my country. I am noticing suffering and big surprises that some of us had. Others probably have their hopes close to coming true.

Our world is painful because we cannot accept its power to change and our impermanence. It is not change itself that is painful but our resistance to it. Moreover, we are exporting pain to places like Bangladesh, where our clothes are sewn, or to nature, where we bear responsibility for the incredible destruction of species—and yet we don’t even recognize that animals are capable of suffering. My daughter shared with me one of the optional classes that she enrolled in, and it is called “empathy across species” and I was embarrassed to realize that I never thought that animals could have empathy. We exclude those who suffer from the world of work, confine the elderly to homes, and try to delay death as long as possible.

Many people have forgotten that we are part of this world and, therefore, so part of the eternal cycle of becoming, change, and decay.

The less we surrender to this reality and the more artificial situations we create to protect ourselves, the more we help what we do not want to see return through the back door—in a different form, often one we have little control over. I am convinced, and shared with you, that to win a “battle” you have to become your enemy, the one that you hated too much. So what value-added, does the win have, Ultimately, we must admit that everything we dislike and everything we believe is beyond our control, was created by us. Talking to some friends, I said that we are all responsible for all the wars that we have now on this planet. And he was quite surprised about my conclusion. In reality, our thoughts, (no) actions, our behavior, ethics, decisions, etc – that we make with each human interaction, are the drivers for the (lack of) life that we live today.

There is nothing for which we are not (co-)responsible. This is hard to understand because we have become masters at looking for—and usually finding—responsibility in “others.”

How can I live with such responsibility without losing my laughter, cheerfulness, and good sleep?

Acceptance of what is, helps us regain these qualities. And doing your part of the work in anything that you believe in. They are essential for changing anything. For some of us, this is a difficult path because daily suffering is not easy to bear. Everything in this world is connected; every person is also a mirror for you.

We only have ourselves, and no one will come to save us.

Our world is in constant flux; it is born every morning and dies every evening (metaphorically speaking). We assume the world will be the same tomorrow when we wake up as when we go to sleep. This certainty is both necessary and good. Yet, the morning may be different from the evening— for example, what happened with elections here for some of us. The world is not worse in such moments, just different.

Taking care of ourselves when necessary, and helping when someone is going through difficult times—are all part of our humanity. Resisting what is, shouting “why, why,” is something we do to keep reality at bay and deny it. It is our frantic attempt to maintain some control over something much greater and wiser than us:
Life.

Saying “YES” to what is, also allows us to rediscover our laughter and cheerfulness—because why not laugh at things we cannot change anyway? And then go to work, enjoy the Christmas holidays, and all the other things that are on your plate –  from this state of being.