Right Living

Another key to Right Living is to quit talking and start listening.  Based on my behavior you're better off not talking so much because the other person isn't listening that closely - if they're listening at all - and on the rare occasions that they are actually listening they're not very interested in what you're talking about.  They're thinking about what they're going to say to advance their own agenda and convince you - if you disagree with them - that you're wrong and they're right.

Can't you see this, especially, when people talk about politics or religion or other touchy subjects?  People aren't listening.  You're not going to change their minds.  If someone brings up politics and uses one of these words in the first few sentences - always or never - then I'm not going to engage with them.  They're done.  They're cooked.  It's over.

I'm not great at remembering prayers but one section of the St. Francis of Assisi Prayer has stuck with me: "Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand: and to be loved as to love."  When I'm talking to someone I try to put aside my prejudices and preconceived notions and really understand where they're coming from.

Negative thinking is a habit that can be changed - if we really want to change it.

Time and space have a way of putting things into perspective so that we can see the right and the wrong to be able to forgive or ask forgiveness.  Life has a way of working itself out to certain ends, a time for everything, and what has been lost will be regained many times over.