Feeling Good

Winnie the Pooh is a wise bear. When Piglet asked: “How do you spell love?” Pooh replied: “You don’t spell it. You feel it.”

Feel it? Yes feel it. Comfort. Safe. Wanted by someone and wanting someone. Just sharing space. Sharing time. No words needed. Just together. From love.

Another way of feeling good comes from Abraham Lincoln:

            “When I do good, I feel good. When I do bad, I feel bad. That’s my religion.”

All great religious thought dwells on good and love as the result of living true. It is the way and the end. Yet we often lose sight of that. Even our churches lose sight of it from time to time. Arguments. Struggles of conscience. Resentments. Lack of forgiveness toward others; worse – toward oneself!

Be good. Do good. Feel good. Pretty simple. Yet we shirk from this way of living because we have fear. Of what? Maybe we fear being viewed as simple? Or naïve? Or being taken advantage of? If we do feel fear, then we probably don’t feel love.

I think fear is related to courage, but Ambrose Redmoon reminds us:

“Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something  else is more important than fear.”

Fear and courage related. One keeps us from acting out our values or beliefs, while the other enables us to do so. It takes courage to live a principled life. It takes courage to push back fear and live fully anyway. Yes I may be hurt by others when living in this manner. However, I learn from their action that they didn't really hurt me; they damaged themselves. Nothing spotlights the low road better than the view from the high road!

Mark Twain gave us this quip: “The more I learn about people, the more I like my dog.”

Perhaps we can change that a bit. A bit because I can only change myself – or not!  I certainly cannot change another person, though! Impossible. We all know that. That doesn't stop us from trying, does it? We push our kids to be something we don’t know if it suits them. We expect wonderful things from leaders we elect without giving them the support people or resources to actually accomplish what we want them to. We hamper them with countervailing sots who only think of their own political power. We expect our spouses to fulfill our ideal rather than allowing them to live fully the person they are. We fell in love with them for many reasons; why change them into another person later?

From the internet comes this anonymous quote:

            “Life is like a camera…

             Focus on what’s important,

             Capture the good times,

             Develop from the negatives,

             And if things don’t work out,

            Take another shot.”

Love that! What is important is love and the good it brings into our lives. With that we can work towards ideals that will raise up lots of others. If we do our job at this, others will do their job, too. Eventually we will enrich the quality of life for all simply and easily. For all. Not just a few. All.

That idea makes me feel good. Doing good makes me feel good. Being good allows me to love others and myself. I think it makes me more lovable, too. And that’s not a bad thing. No; not at all!

June 12, 2013