Should Be

God doesn’t care about how you think things should be.

You can shoulda, woulda, coulda all day and it won’t change the world.  It won’t change your life, either.

God’s gifts are only available when you accept things as they are.  That’s the only way you can see things clearly and change your choices to get a different and better outcome in the future.

You know the drill: “Give me the strength to change what I can, the serenity to accept what I can not change and the wisdom to know the difference.”   Living without serenity, without surrender means that you give up any capacity you do have to make change in the world.

The ego, though, wants to avoid discomfort.   That means avoiding change, and the easiest way to do that is to convince you that it’s not you that has to change, it’s the world around you that has to change.

“They should change!” the ego screams.  “It’s all their fault, not mine!  If things were just the way they should be, my choices would be great and easy!   They should heal my way, on my schedule!  I blame the world! I blame the universe!  I blame God!   She should change!”

Only problem is that God doesn’t care about how you think things should be.

The challenge for each of us is to get the ego in check.  Since our ego grew up alongside of us, it knows us intimately, and the biggest trick it ever learned is how to project a huge, scary monster in front of us, one that will terrify us enough to keep us stuck, keep us demanding the world change rather than us having to change.

The ego pulls up all the threats that it has learned throw fear into us.   You are just a failure, an imposter, unlovable and alone, so it is better to stuff your feelings rather than engage them.   You have no chance of success in finding new ways to be in the world, in fact, all that will do is cut you off from everything you used to have, cut you off from your old dreams.  The world is a bleak and horrifying place, so you need to stay defended, need to stay small, need to keep valuing ego fear over anything else.

God doesn’t care about how you think things should be.  When the ego plays all those tricks to keep us stuck, keep us railing at others in the world, it disconnects us from God, even the creator inside of us.

If you believe the ego, staying defended, you see everything as loss.   If you see everything as loss,  you will never look for solutions, for change, for possibilities.  The worldview of “I’m screwed” doesn’t empower you to look for solutions, new and different choices that will change the outcome of your experience.   Impatience is just the key to frustration and not a way that you can actually be present to fully embrace new possibilities when they show themselves.

You cannot simultaneously go forwards and backwards, no matter what the ego tells you.  If you want a new life, new possibilities in a new world, want the strength to change what you can change, you have to accept what you can’t change.   You can’t hold onto past expectations, habits and dreams and also become new and potent in the world as it is.

The truth is that we rarely remember the past as it was, we remember it as the ego thinks it should have been.   What we had then was not the reality of a perfect time, but the dreams of how the world should be perfect.   Old dreams, you see, are often the hardest things to release so we can become new, for the ego asks us if we lose our dreams, what will we have to comfort us?  Living beyond fear, that’s what.

God doesn’t care about how you think things should be.   Letting go of all the shoulda, woulda, coulda notions you hold is always the first step to accepting what you cannot change, the first step to finding the wisdom and strength to change what you can in your life.

Changing your life is also the first step to changing the world.   If you really believe this world should be different, the only way you can help is to be the change you wish to see in the world.    If it is to be, it is up to me.

To change the world, you first have to understand the world as it is, then you have to find ways to make it new, find ways to manifest your dreams in it.

God doesn’t care about how you think things should be.    God’s gifts are only available when you accept things as they are.  When you get that, you open to what she can offer you, open to the transformation of becoming more actualized, more harmonious, more righteous.

And I’m going to guarantee that your ego won’t like that experience.