What Helps You to Find the Bright Side of Life?

Quote by Helen Keller 

Someone asked a question;

What helps you to find the Bright Side of life?

and I answered it... 

I have gone through some rough times (not the same as yours, but rough still). 

THERE HAVE BEEN TIMES when I could not stand
certain aspects of my life. Which was hard, because there was still so much good in my life to love - if I could only keep my mind on those aspects, rather than on the ones I wanted to eliminate from my life (which, by the way, weren't always in my control to eliminate)... Times when I WANTED to CHANGE - SO MUCH OF what affected MY LIFE - and yet, there was so much that either had to stay the same or was out of my control to change, that I didn't know how to change the parts I wanted to change without changing what I couldn't change. Does this make sense?

 ~ Anyhow... I prayed HARD pleading with the lord to help me. And he answered with this one loving command, which has entirely CHANGED MY LIFE...

"Live your life AS IF IT IS ALREADY the way you want it to be."

I began to run that sentence through my mind - over and over again -  When I would find myself making a sneer over the way someone did something that appalled me I would think something like, "if my life were already the way I want it to be - he wouldn't be doing that appalling thing, so I wouldn't be disgusted. I would be smiling not tempted to make a discussed expression;" and so I would smile instead of sneering...

Truthfully, I learned in a way that words can not convey - It TRULY is NOT what happens that matters; it's what you do with what happens to you that matters... It really wasn't what "he" did that decreased my own happiness; it was my own response - my sneer - my judgment - that diminished my own happiness!

The words seems so shallow now... To understand and believe these words are true is not the same as to experience and KNOW that they are true with every fiber of your being...

Anyhow, the better I got at following this counsel, the happier my life felt and the more my life truly became what I wanted it to be.

I learned that my happiness is not dependent upon what others do to me or how others affect may my life.

My happiness is determined by what I choose to believe and do with what happens...on how I choose to respond (rather than simply "reacting" as the natural man would have me do) and by what I choose to think about and meditate upon...

Enough said for now.

Corine :D