Why The Moaning Has To Stop

This morning, I had to catch myself, to stop myself from complaining and moaning about my job.  It is all too easy to moan, being British, it seems to be something that we do rather well.  It is almost as if it is part of the culture.  We moan about the weather, the buses running late, the queues at the post office, the state of the country.  In fact, the British will pretty much moan about anything and everything, there is no subject that is off limits.  But I am not here to bemoan the British way of life, I am here to focus on my own life and how I feel about it, when I catch myself moaning.

Moaning.  To moan, is to utter a constant barrage of complaints, lamenting a given situation.  In my first job, I would walk around the office and either be a party to, or overhear conversations where my fellow workers would complain about the pay, the conditions, their manager, the direction the company was heading in, their lack of responsibility, their workload, the car parking in the employee car park - basically everything.  Two things are clear in my mind from back then.  First and perhaps because of the situation from which I had escaped, I was happy and proud to be working in those offices, doing what I was doing.  For sure the pay was not great, but the situation was a whole lot better than standing on a production line, inserting plastic gutters into the back of a refrigerator and securing them with two small plastic rivets, one thousand four hundred times per day.  I fully appreciated where I was, and knew, even at the age of seventeen, that life could be a whole lot worse, because it had been.

Secondly, when I heard these conversations, a question arose in my mind.  I wondered why, if things were so bad and clearly that person was extremely unhappy working there, why they just did not leave and work somewhere else?  I did not understand why anyone would accept the situation that they were in. This is for me, a very significant time in my life.  It is obvious to me, that even back then, I knew that I would never stay in a situation that made me unhappy.  I just did not see the point in doing so.  I thought back then, as I still do today, that if something makes you unhappy, you have two clear choices, you either change the situation, or you accept it.

That is basically how I live my life.  All the while that I am happy, I stay where I am, doing what I do, being with who I am with.  The moment that I become unhappy, then I act, and I make a change.  I have never seen the need to maintain a situation that is negative passed a certain point.  There comes a time when my heart says "No more" and when I can no longer feel my heart in something, then I know that it is time to move on, to go somewhere new, to let a person go their own way, or to try something new.

My life history is filled with such decisions.  I had to drop all of my so-called friends because I could take no more of their ridicule and bullying.  I changed jobs because I no longer felt in tune with the company for which I was working.  I changed my home because I felt the need to be some place else.  I let friendships go because those people were no longer my kind of people, or no longer thought the way that I did.  I changed myself because I was not happy with the way I looked.  I finished relationships because I could no longer feel my heart in them.  I did not spend time complaining about my situations, I did not waste my energy moaning about them.  I simply stood up one day and said "Enough.  Today is the day that I make the change."  From that moment on, I was committed to moving on, to changing my life, to eradicating the situation that was making me unhappy.

Life is short and we only get one go on the merry-go-round.  Why would you want to keep negative situations in your life, situations that make you unhappy?  What purpose do they serve you?  It is my belief that people who moan and complain like to do so.  It is as if they have something to prove, that they are able to keep going in the face of adversity.  I think these people are cowards and live their lives out of fear.  You may disagree and think to yourself that some people are unable to change their situation, that they are trapped in a certain situation.  With some very minor exceptions involving imprisonment and slavery, I do not believe that to be true.  What is true of humanity, is that we each are capable of change.  We are each able to alter our situation.  Yes, some situations are more difficult to change than others, but they can all be changed - if you are willing.  People who moan are generally speaking not willing to change their lives.  Moaners and complainers are people who have given up on their dreams.  They are people who believe that they are undeserving of their dreams and of happiness, they are people who feel resentment and bitterness.   

Moaning is an expression of negativity.  Change is an expression of positivity.  What I realised this morning, as I was eating my breakfast cereal and enjoying my first coffee of the day, was that I was in danger of falling into the trap of moaning about my life and doing nothing about it.  I am not that person.  I never have been, and I never will be.  I empower myself to act.  I empower myself to change.  And I allow myself to be happy.  I cast aside unhappiness and situations that do not work for me, and I seek out those that do.  Those that bring me joy, a smile to my face, and a warm glow in my heart.  For me, this is the way of the one true path.  This is how I will continue to walk in the light.

Today, I decided not to moan about my life.  I decided that if I continue to be here, doing what I do, working where I work, then I am going to shut up about those things that make me unhappy.  If they were really such a big problem, I would change my place of work, I would move on again.  In exchange for not moaning, life showed me exactly why I do what I do, where I do it.  This morning, on my two dives, I was rewarded with sharks, rays and a huge array of life under the ocean.  Later in the afternoon, I swam the short distance from the beach to our dive boat and I jumped off the top deck.  As I did, I let out a loud "Whoo-hoo!" and let the child inside of me escape, I gave the child his wings to fly free.  Life is not so bad.  I have no reason to moan.  I have no reason to complain.  I am where I want to be, doing what I love to do.  Life has been kind, but the moment it is not, you will never hear me moaning about it.  You will never hear me complaining.  That is a promise I make to myself and to my heart.

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Even Those That Walk The Path Must Suffer

Some days, it is hard not to feel bitter and affected by the things that have occurred in your life.  Every single person suffers at one time or another, no one is exempt.  Not even those of us who profess to be walking our one true path are exempt from suffering the afflictions of failure, or from feeling plagued by doubts about the journey and the direction of the path.  This is all part of what it means to walk the path.  This is what it means to be alive. 

I am feeling this way right now.  Within me, a bitterness has crept upon me and taken hold, wrapping its tendrils of fear and hate around my heart.  I am not conscious of it all of the time, but in quiet moments of reflection, I find it there, whispering acid and noxious words, trying to smother the light of my soul with its dark cloak of negativity.

How can it be that a person who proclaims such happiness can suffer affliction and carry negativity and unhappiness within themselves?  The answer to that is simply this: I am human.  But there is also something more.  I am strongly connected to my heart and my heart is my life.  And because of this deep connection I have with my heart, I feel my emotions keenly. 

I am walking my one true path, of this I am absolutely and unequivocally sure. I know this is true because of the general way in which I view life.  My life has been an amazing journey and for this, I am truly grateful and appreciative.  I smile often.  I laugh for no reason, other than because of the joy I am feeling at that moment.  I am passionate about what I do.  These are the things that tell me I am on the right path.  I have been able to take advantage of opportunities that have come my way, opportunities that have shaped my destiny and allowed me to discover my own truth, my own path.  All that I have achieved, everything that I have witnessed and experienced has been possible because of one single reason.  I have been alone pretty much all of my adult life, I have never had anyone to share my path for more than a fleeting instant.  And that has been both a gift and a curse to me.

I have fulfilled many of my dreams in life.  Some of these dreams I did not know even existed until I discovered them.  I consider myself to have been extremely fortunate.  I was working at the hotel the other day, talking to some people about my life, and how I changed my stars and sought out my true path, when someone asked me if I had any dependents?  "No", I replied.  "Well then", she said, "that makes it much easier for you."  And she was right.  It does.  I have no dependents and I have no responsibilities to any other person.  I never have.  This is why I am able to live the life that I do.  This is how I am able to flit from one place to another like a butterfly that floats on the breeze.  The words that this woman spoke struck deep into me, they struck at my core.  It was certainly not the first time I had thought about this, but hearing it said by another person made it all the harder to bear.

It's not that I ever wanted to live my life alone.  Far from it.  I have always wanted to find the right person, to get married and to start a family.  Each time I have tried to form a relationship, it has gone wrong.  When I got close to settling down, a situation occurred that was to change everything.  I have never had a long term relationship.  I have never known what it is like to have someone by your side that you can rely on, that you can trust, and that you know fully.  I have never gotten that far.  I know that much of this has been my own doing.  I am not blameless.  I know the one major reason that my relationships have failed has been down to my own feelings of being undeserving of love, and in seeking out the kind of love that was ultimately doomed from the start.  I have invested so much time and effort in trying to make doomed situations work, that I have drained myself of energy and of my own life.  I have worked so hard to prove a point to myself, that no matter what I do, I will never find true and lasting love.  I have been the architect of my own failures.  It is akin to trying to build a skyscraper and knowing full well, that you did not ensure that there were solid foundations.

And here lies the basis for my feelings of negativity and bitterness.  I ask myself whether I have missed my chance of a family?  I am after all, now in my early forties and time is flowing ever constantly on.  Did I overlook any opportunities?  Should I have persevered longer in a relationship?  Did I take the easy route?  Did I run, when I should have stayed?  Is life playing a cruel trick on me, denying me the one thing I have sought the most? 

I'll never know the answers and they matter not.  I am here and it is now.  Everything that I have done, everything that I have experienced has brought me to here.  To this point.  I have been on a voyage of discovery about myself and I have learned so much.  Last year I finally had my eyes opened to the lesson of my life, that I saw myself as being undeserving of love.  Now, perhaps, armed with that knowledge, I have a real chance.  I think I always knew that I needed to strike out and to reach for my path.  It was something that always dwelt within me.  I now walk my one true path.  I am ready.  I may be late, but I am here now.  All I need do, is find a special someone who also understands the simple gifts of life, who can see that life is an opportunity not to be wasted, and someone who will laugh for no reason, just because they feel like doing it.  I am here.  I am waiting.  My search goes on.

When you walk your one true path, you will never be exempt from the feelings of bitterness, negativity, anger, fear, anguish, and anxiety.  These are all humans emotions and to live a life in tune with your heart, is to feel all of your emotions.  If you are walking your one true path, these feelings never last long.  At your core you will know love.  Love defeats every other emotion.  With love in your heart, you are invincible.  The tendrils of negativity will wither and die, they will be burned away by the bright glow and fire of love.  But you must know these feelings of negativity and make them your allies, because they help you to know that you are walking your true path.  If you cannot shake them, then the path is not true.  The true path is the path of positivity, of love and of the light.

And with this, goes my bitterness and my resentment.  My path has taught me much and it has shown me miracles.  I have total faith in my heart.  My heart is love and love is the light.  So I shall keep on walking, knowing that when the time is right for me, she will come. 

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