MANIK: GIFT

Everything is a gift. To accept what has come to you at this moment in your life as being exactly what it is, is the beginning of the deeper maturity. It is only in receiving, accepting and living life as it actually is that we can begin to see the gifts hidden within our experiences. If we resist, ignore, defend against, pretend, or try to avoid what is happening to us, we will never be able to learn what this moment is offering.

It is not that this moment is as we would necessarily wish it to be. It is not that we have chosen it, or deserve it, or that we even like it. It is simply that it has arrived and it cannot, be other than it is. Life begins to have a sense of being complete in itself when we grow strong enough to face what comes to us without wasting our energy in complaining that events should be different than they are. It is this acceptance that enables us to respond to events as they happen, with spontaneity, endurance, skill and wisdom.

The dance of life becomes so much easier and more beautiful when we are able to move in the direction that the river is flowing without fighting it or wishing it to be different.