Sunday Journal, 612 words
My Sunday Journal
By Dalton Roberts
IPS Features
Remember the best seller,
"Bad Things Happen To Good People"? Strange that a man could have a
best seller saying something we all really know. Not one person on Earth has
failed to see that bad things happen to good people.
Most self-help best
sellers are restatements of obvious truths. But we need those restatements. We
are so prone to the pulling of our own legs.
It is equally true that
good things happen to bad people. Hitler had some great victories and high times
before he got around to putting a bullet in his own brain deep in a Berlin bomb
shelter. Serial killer John Gacy was honored by the Jaycees for community
service while he was killing young boys.
Another truth is that
good people do bad things to good people. Some of life's deepest hurts come from
people we know well and trust. People who have been good to us for years. Even a
good person can have a critical weakness or a tendency unknown to us. Isn't it
true that we have some weaknesses unknown to even our closest friends?
We will do well to know
that just about anything can happen here on Earth and no matter what comes our
way, we only have two choices: roll with it and try to come through it with some
degree of aplomb, or let it roll over us and turn us into a pancake.
Victor Frankl survived a
Nazi concentration camp. His pregnant wife and several members of his family did
not. There is no more profound truth than his statement that the only freedom we
always have is the attitude we will take toward whatever happens to us.
Most of our
self-upsetting reactions to bad things happening to good people and good people
doing bad things to good people is our addiction to finding perfection in people
and events. If there is any perfection in anyone or any happening, it is
accepting things for what they are and learning how to deal with it all in the
way that works best for everyone concerned.
The very fact that we
classify people as "good" and "bad" is unrealistic. Jesus
said, "There is none good." He could have spoken just as truthfully if
He had said, "There is none without good." The evident truth is that
we all have all kinds of qualities. Some of the qualities we consider
"good" are not viewed as good by others. Some we may consider
"bad" would be completely acceptable to others.
We have guidelines like
the Golden Rule, the Ten Commandments and all the world's revered writings but
those writings say if we are to "be perfect as our Father in heaven is
perfect," we must remember that He sends the rain on everyone, he makes the
sun to shine on everyone – in other words, he blesses everyone as they are.
Sometimes I write what I
am needing myself. I have become more aware of that and I'm learning that my
habit of putting people and life's happenings into pigeonholes like
"good" and "bad" is one of my basic frustrations. How much
better to take time to look at individuals and events with compassion and as
much understanding as we can gain.
When that doesn't work,
find some aspect to laugh about. Every person and situation has some absurd
aspect strong enough to bring on a smile or even a good belly laugh. Finding it
is fun. It helps to live with all the parts we don't understand and there will
always be plenty of those.
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