Coming home from town today these thoughts hit me about Blessings and curses, or good luck and bad luck. Blessed or cursed is often seen from different perspectives and differently from the person. Evil can never be good nor can good ever be evil. Blessings and curses though are not quite as black and white as they appear and it may take years to see what it was. But bad and good, that is totally different just as evil and good are, those are truly black and white. Depending on our culture and beliefs is what most base which is which on, but almost everything that happens can be bad posing as good and good posing as bad, or turned into the other.
Physical Beauty is one of those things that can be a curse or a blessing, depending on how one uses the trait. Abused one can have vanity and pride, two words associated in a positive way today. Yet here is the thing. Now if that doesn't sound right take a look at the men and women on TV, movies, magazines, and sales. Healthy, one can boast in how healthy they are and indeed some do. It can be to the point of bragging with some. While it's good to take pride in your work, it isn't good to be proud of yourself, or what you do. There are so many more things that people call blessings.
Curses or bad luck are just the opposite. Not so physically pretty, sick, or just average at what one does, but tries hard. People are not as open and nice to people who are unattractive. People who are sick or have health issues are usually avoided, even when it doesn't spread. People who do a good job and take pride in what they do, but not themselves are not as "successful". The extra same goes with possessions.
The fact that all of what I just mentioned in the blessings could very well become or are curses isn't thought of as nothing but blessings. Each of those are fleeting, each are unsustainable, each can be gone in the blink of an eye. Beauty gets a man or woman that first date, maybe even a few dates, but inner beauty, unless the person attracted is shallow, doesn't keep them together. The one with beauty doesn't have to develop inner beauty like the one who has less physical beauty, but it is that inner beauty that hooks the other person. What is left though when the physical beauty leaves, and it will one day either by time or events. The same goes with the healthy, physically fit people. What happens when that all ends? Time or events will surely place an end to that. The same with those who are prideful in their abilities. Type, talk, walk, craft, own... all can be gone in the blink of an eye.
So back to the original thought. Evil can never be good nor good can never be evil, though intents could make it appear as such. I don't believe in good or bad luck. I sometimes cannot tell if something that looks, feels, and tastes bad are blessings or curses. Only time and what we do are the tellers of what they are. I have seen people with the world say they are cursed and people with nothing say they are blessed. I have seen people with the world that still don't have enough and people with nothing want for nothing else. I've seen people dying and in pain and agony happy and healthy people sad and lonely.
Not always but maybe sometimes it is that we are presented with events in our lives neither a curse nor a blessing, just events. Neutral in reality yet viewed in one or the other the categories. Maybe most of the events we experience or are effected by are just raw events, waiting to be molded into what we call a blessing or a curse, good luck or bad luck. What if we are the sculptor? Lets call that Free Will. For the person who can't find his car keys and gets delayed ten minutes it seems like a curse right up until they find out if they had left on time something terrible would happen. Then it becomes good luck or a blessing. But that one is easy to tell, a quick time frame. What about the ones that take a lifetime?
I don't believe in luck anymore than I do fate. I do believe that we can take a situation and make it become what we and others would call just the opposite. We have that power. We have that freedom. We may not always take a bad thing and make it good, but we can always make it better. I hear people, and I use to be one myself, that says "Why does God let bad things happen?" What if they aren't all bad things? What if they are just things? What if we have the power to make something neutral good or bad? Or at least the bad things a little better. What if that is what life is about, just events and we write in the bad luck/curse or good luck/blessing part. What if it isn't how a person falls but how they get back up, and what they do once they are?
So a story I heard once from a preacher many years ago:
Two twins were born. One was a complete pessimist and the other a complete optimist. Both to the extremes. As they got older the parents worried, so they called in a doctor. He decided they should buy every toy on the market and place in the pessimist's room. In the event, the pessimist would be happy for once. The optimist, the doctor decided would be taken to an empty, dark, isolated barn in the country and locked in an empty stable. They optimist should become just a little pessimistic by day's end. They would leave each a full day.
They went upstairs to the pessimist's room, opened the door, and there sat the boy crying. "What is wrong?", asked the doctor. "With all these toys I don't know which one to open first. I am so confused", screamed the pessimist. Seeing the plan had not worked there he worried, but still thought maybe it had worked on the optimist.
As they approached the barn they heard a joyful whistling sound and saw manure flying out from the stall. They ran to the barn, worried the optimist would get hurt tunneling out and knew they had success. "What are you doing?", asked the doctor. The optimist stopped, turned to the doctor and said with a big grin, "With all this manure in here, I just know there's a pony, and I'm gonna find it."
Maybe it isn't the events, but what we do with them, deal with them, and view them that determines what they are, and who we are.
Physical Beauty is one of those things that can be a curse or a blessing, depending on how one uses the trait. Abused one can have vanity and pride, two words associated in a positive way today. Yet here is the thing. Now if that doesn't sound right take a look at the men and women on TV, movies, magazines, and sales. Healthy, one can boast in how healthy they are and indeed some do. It can be to the point of bragging with some. While it's good to take pride in your work, it isn't good to be proud of yourself, or what you do. There are so many more things that people call blessings.
Curses or bad luck are just the opposite. Not so physically pretty, sick, or just average at what one does, but tries hard. People are not as open and nice to people who are unattractive. People who are sick or have health issues are usually avoided, even when it doesn't spread. People who do a good job and take pride in what they do, but not themselves are not as "successful". The extra same goes with possessions.
The fact that all of what I just mentioned in the blessings could very well become or are curses isn't thought of as nothing but blessings. Each of those are fleeting, each are unsustainable, each can be gone in the blink of an eye. Beauty gets a man or woman that first date, maybe even a few dates, but inner beauty, unless the person attracted is shallow, doesn't keep them together. The one with beauty doesn't have to develop inner beauty like the one who has less physical beauty, but it is that inner beauty that hooks the other person. What is left though when the physical beauty leaves, and it will one day either by time or events. The same goes with the healthy, physically fit people. What happens when that all ends? Time or events will surely place an end to that. The same with those who are prideful in their abilities. Type, talk, walk, craft, own... all can be gone in the blink of an eye.
So back to the original thought. Evil can never be good nor good can never be evil, though intents could make it appear as such. I don't believe in good or bad luck. I sometimes cannot tell if something that looks, feels, and tastes bad are blessings or curses. Only time and what we do are the tellers of what they are. I have seen people with the world say they are cursed and people with nothing say they are blessed. I have seen people with the world that still don't have enough and people with nothing want for nothing else. I've seen people dying and in pain and agony happy and healthy people sad and lonely.
Not always but maybe sometimes it is that we are presented with events in our lives neither a curse nor a blessing, just events. Neutral in reality yet viewed in one or the other the categories. Maybe most of the events we experience or are effected by are just raw events, waiting to be molded into what we call a blessing or a curse, good luck or bad luck. What if we are the sculptor? Lets call that Free Will. For the person who can't find his car keys and gets delayed ten minutes it seems like a curse right up until they find out if they had left on time something terrible would happen. Then it becomes good luck or a blessing. But that one is easy to tell, a quick time frame. What about the ones that take a lifetime?
I don't believe in luck anymore than I do fate. I do believe that we can take a situation and make it become what we and others would call just the opposite. We have that power. We have that freedom. We may not always take a bad thing and make it good, but we can always make it better. I hear people, and I use to be one myself, that says "Why does God let bad things happen?" What if they aren't all bad things? What if they are just things? What if we have the power to make something neutral good or bad? Or at least the bad things a little better. What if that is what life is about, just events and we write in the bad luck/curse or good luck/blessing part. What if it isn't how a person falls but how they get back up, and what they do once they are?
So a story I heard once from a preacher many years ago:
Two twins were born. One was a complete pessimist and the other a complete optimist. Both to the extremes. As they got older the parents worried, so they called in a doctor. He decided they should buy every toy on the market and place in the pessimist's room. In the event, the pessimist would be happy for once. The optimist, the doctor decided would be taken to an empty, dark, isolated barn in the country and locked in an empty stable. They optimist should become just a little pessimistic by day's end. They would leave each a full day.
They went upstairs to the pessimist's room, opened the door, and there sat the boy crying. "What is wrong?", asked the doctor. "With all these toys I don't know which one to open first. I am so confused", screamed the pessimist. Seeing the plan had not worked there he worried, but still thought maybe it had worked on the optimist.
As they approached the barn they heard a joyful whistling sound and saw manure flying out from the stall. They ran to the barn, worried the optimist would get hurt tunneling out and knew they had success. "What are you doing?", asked the doctor. The optimist stopped, turned to the doctor and said with a big grin, "With all this manure in here, I just know there's a pony, and I'm gonna find it."
Maybe it isn't the events, but what we do with them, deal with them, and view them that determines what they are, and who we are.
