Whether we know it or not, we each have a box within our mind where we stuff away some of our thoughts, ideas, dreams, fears, and prejudices. We started when we were young, not even aware of doing it. It could have been something like your fear of water, or an old saying such as “if you step on a crack, you break your mother’s back,” or the idea that you’re not successful unless you are rich, or the belief that you’ll never amount to anything, or the dream of becoming a doctor despite coming from a low-income family, or so many other things. Those thoughts or ideas we unwittingly hold onto and have held close have influenced our way of living.

Do you believe your hopes and dreams cannot become real, so it is best not to bring them out of your box? Do you feel your prejudices are the only way to think? Have you allowed whatever you have put into your box to stay there without thought or review, or are they stuck there because you are unwilling to see them differently?

Maybe it is time you look inside your box to see what you have placed inside and whether any of them are worth keeping. Time sheds new light and perspective on our life experiences, so those beliefs, prejudices, hopes, and dreams may not be the same today as when you put them inside…yet they remain there.

Sometimes, it takes courage to look inside your box. Most humans don’t like change, nor do we like to be wrong about anything. We’ll fight to the end to prove our thoughts are the only way for people to think or act.

Once you take the leap and open your box, you may be surprised that it contains more negative than positive ideas and beliefs. When you consider each thought or belief, you must evaluate whether those destructive ones have become a part of who you are. This review can be painful, but when you study them, you will realize that the negative ones are based on fear, and by exposing them as that, they lose their fearfulness and power.

By exploring your box, you can tell how you live your life. Do you live like the glass is half-empty or half-full? By releasing some of what you have stuffed into your thought box that no longer serves you, you will find yourself feeling freer and less burdened in your everyday living.

This is a crucial time in our history when every thought matters. It has become so easy to blame everyone and everything for anything negative in our lives that we feel we have no power over how we live. We have forgotten that it is us alone that creates how we live. Our life is nothing more or less than a chain of our choices. Knowing this, it’s a time to get out a broom, open your mind box, sweep out what no longer suits you, and live the way you want with love, peace, gratitude, and happiness.

JOAN S. PECK is an editor and author of short stories, spiritual books, and novels and a contributing author in several anthologies. She served as former Editor in Chief for Chic Compass magazine, an international magazine based in Las Vegas.

Joan is a writer of both non-fiction and fiction books. She first began writing in 2008 as an author of spiritual non-fiction books. Prime Threat Shattering the Power of Addiction, written with her son after his death in 2005, won a Top Shelf Book Award Nominee.

Nine years later, she published her first fiction books under the pen name J.S. Peck and won a Top Pick for Spirited Woman for Death on the Strip, the first book of her six-book mystery Death Card Series. Through her strong, likable characters, Joan has become known for expressing addiction and human sex trafficking concerns throughout her fiction books. She has an extraordinary writing ability filled with humor and tenderness that brings readers into each book’s storyline, holding them hostage until the end.

Her books are available on all book sites, and her website (Writing with Soul) – www.JoanSPeck.com

With all the name-calling and things taken out of context and spread across social media, where does that leave the truth? Has it become that truth is left like beauty “in the eyes of the beholder,” or is there more to it?

Although there is such a thing as perspective and seeing things from one’s own viewpoint, how does that work when dealing with others demanding only their way of seeing things or the highway?

We have reached a divide that is ever deepening within our country today, leaving all of us bewildered by knowing that the truth in most situations is murky. We no longer trust those in power to speak the whole truth. Indeed, we have seen this repeatedly demonstrated in high-profile tweets that twist any situation to override the facts and real happenings to prevent personal degradation.

That worries me.

Have we become so lazy that it is easier to believe an untruth rather than seek the truth by looking into a situation from many different angles and reaching our own conclusions? Or is it easier to accept negative thoughts and ideas that brew violence?

Some of us today seem to get a thrill from downgrading another person without seeking the truth. They are the discontents of the world, pursuing satisfaction from hurting someone else—a dark side to human beings that brings out the “beast” in us.

We see that when children and adults get bullied. They are picked upon by someone who feels threatened in some way. The bully starts the taunting … but never alone. Bullies always gather others around them, calling out disparaging, hurtful things, and untruths, leaving the one bullied with little recourse to make things right. From there, it can escalate into physical violence. And we all know what that can lead to—broken hearts and even death.

Listen to the news or scan social media, and you can see the massive, unending misinformation that exists today. Truth doesn’t stand a chance.

Is it truth to speak ill of another person? Is it truth to steal from another? Is it truth to physically hurt someone else? Is it truth to threaten or take another’s life for having a different stance or opinion?

We will never realize our TRUTH unless we can understand and accept that we are all one.

It is simple, really. Everything is energy … every single thing … coming from one source. We all are connected by being part of that same source of energy. What one does to another, one does to all.

Truth is knowing that our purpose in life is to act in the energy of love, show kindness and consideration to another, and allow differences of opinion without threat. Truth is loving ourselves enough to be in harmony with the Universe. Truth is living the best we can to model our good words and actions to all children who depend upon us for protection against malice. That is our TRUTH.

When is the last time you did a happy dance?  That dance that reminds you and lets anyone watching you know that life is good?  When is the last time you looked into a mirror and ignored your wrinkles and other marks of living a stressful life and were able to exclaim out loud, “You‘ve got it going, girl?” I mean … said it and felt it?  If it’s been a while, it’s time for you to regroup and get into that space of appreciating who you are.

I know for myself it doesn’t seem to matter how many times I get into a state where I can do my happy dance when events and people do and say things that begin to unravel the appreciation I have for myself.  And I’m not alone.  We are continually reminded that life is all about riding the roller coaster of frequently feeling up and down and experiencing good and bad happenings.  And we find ourselves easily buying into that and are willing to accept that premise as something that is always going to be there and can’t be changed.  Or can it?

The reality is that we live with other people in our lives, whether on a personal level or a more distant or superficial one.  Through the media, we have become acquainted with what is going on worldwide and have a bird’s eye view into what other people are doing and saying, which can affect us whether in a significant or very minor way. Much of what we see and hear is negative, bringing us down to worrying about things we have no control over. Therein lies the real issue.  For how can we dance our happy dance with so much in the world going sideways?

I have found the best piece of advice of how we can exist and feel good about ourselves is when we understand our limitations – that it doesn’t make sense for us to claim responsibility for anyone or anything outside our control or influence.  That comes from the AA serenity prayer,  “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”  For me, this says it all. 

When we realize that happiness begins and ends within our own power of being, we can become happy, self-assured, confident, and worthy of good self-esteem.  And that increases each time we can put ourselves to bed at night knowing we have done the best we could during the day to live up to that prayer.  That doesn’t mean we won’t have days wishing we could have a do-over because we are human and not perfect in all our choices.  So, my friend, use some of these words from the Happy Dance song and create your own happy dance:

Hey, yeah, you
In the back of the room with those concrete shoes
It’s okay to cut loose
Oh, it ain’t about how you move, but what moves you
We’re so consumed with what we think we’re supposed to be
That we stop living like we know that we’re free.