The Wisdom to Know the Difference

   
     I feel like everyone needs to hear it. Even though most people have seen it their entire life no one really lives by it. I’ve been keeping to myself for the most part. I don’t go out much. If you know me at all, you know I’m a social butterfly. I guess I realized I needed to reel some things back in and get some things sorted out. So if you invited me to something I would want to go. But I would choose to stay in. Little things didn’t seem so important anymore and unfortunately, while I was working on myself I accidentally pushed everyone out and isolated myself only hurting me in the long run. So if you were one these people that I pushed out, just know that I miss you and pray for you daily.

Which brings me to my next point. You couldn’t read a title like that and not expect this to be faith based right? Now when I was a little girl, I went to church every Wednesday and Sunday.  When I was in the second grade and had a crush on my girl best friend, I prayed for the lord to change me because I didn’t want to go to hell. Later in life, I even had it out with my best friend, at the time, when I first came out as bisexual. They said their peace and I said mine and that was it. We accepted it and moved on. And that’s where everyone gets lost. Someone always has to be right. Now of course there is always a right and a wrong. But we’re getting tied up in being right. Now, in the instances where there’s no way to know who is right and who is wrong, we have to take it for face value, accept it, and move on. But everyone forgets to know the difference. Now I’m no saint. Up until recently I had no wisdom to know the difference. I’ve never been one to think before I speak so if you’re saying things to get a rise out of me, you more than likely will. And then one day it’s like literally everything clicked. Miraculously, I started to think before I spoke. And I can’t say I’m not happy with the results. I had to step back and look at situations like ok. Is what I’m about to say going to help or hurt this situation. And if it’s not going to be beneficial, then I thought of something that would help instead. It’s not something that I’ve been able to do overnight, and trust and believe I have been tested. But I’ve come to realize, in most circumstances, it’s not me, it’s the situation.

No one is perfect and no one is going to be the same type of person you are. We’re so focused on everyone’s flaws and their imperfections and judging them for being what makes them who they are that we can’t see that these are the things that make them special. I’m sorry but I don’t think I could much tolerate someone who was just like me. That would be rather boring no matter how funny I am. I’ve found asking myself in certain situations “ if they were behaving or reacting to this situation in the way in which I believe that they should, what would happen?” When instead I should be asking myself  “What can I do to make this situation more positive for this person?”
 A natural human reaction is. “They hurt me, so now I have to hurt them too.” Once again, super guilty on this one. But its never too early to start over, and it’s never to late to grow.


There are some people in my life that opened my eyes to who I used to be. There are people in my life who seen who I was hidden under my wall of fears. There are people who showed me who I could be and there are people who told me who I should be.  There have been people that have seen the worst in me and there are people that have seen the best of me. At the end of the day, they are the many pieces of me that make me every bit of who I am. For the first time in my life, I’ve found myself. And this whole time that I was trying to find myself, I was blind to the fact that who I am was right in front of my face. All of these things are me. I just had to put them all in the right places.

 Moral of the story: you cannot change someone else’s behavior. You cannot change someone else’s reactions to certain situations. But you can change you and your reactions. To the people that have guided me back to my faith and have helped me get to where I am, I’m eternally grateful and love you ever so much. To everyone else I love and care for: May God grant you the serenity to accept the things you cannot change, the courage to change the things you can, and the wisdom to know the difference.