“If it (suffering) is avoidable, the meaningful thing to do is remove its cause…If, on the other hand, one cannot change a situation that causes his suffering, he can still choose his attitude.” -Viktor E. Frankl
If you have a rock in your shoe, you stop and remove it unless you are a masochistic.
If you have arthritis, you learn to deal with it. You choose how to respond.
This is one of the most freeing concepts to me. Amid some trauma or world-shattering incident, the only thing you can control is you. Chaos and rage ensue when we think we can change what happened. The suffering may be from your own doing or someone else but either way the solution is the same, focus on you.
How do you hold onto water? With open hands and a gentle grip. If you try to squeeze water it will run right out of your hands.
The more we fight to make sense of it all, and try to squeeze answers out the more frustrated we will become.
But if we step back and hold the situation with open hands we can gain a perspective that helps us to begin to accept what has happened and allow us to begin to move forward.
We can’t always control what happens to us but we can control how we will respond.