Look on the Bright Side.

Do you remember when you were young and people told you to look on the bright side? No, not the Monty Python version. It was these deep pithy sayings that carried a lot of weight. So much depth. So much meaning, yet forever lost in a young person’s mind. Those older folks were trying to convey a lesson. Yes, be optimistic, but even more recognize that optimism comes from two important variables; where you look and on which side. There’s only two choices of sides to pick and you get to decide which one you are looking at. What a fantastic discovery. So, when you have been feeling some kind of way for a long time now, maybe you have been looking at the wrong stuff. Maybe you have been tricked into always looking left when your blessings are on the right. Perhaps you have been too distracted with the cares of this life to even be aware where your gaze is focused. Are you waking up in the morning without the usual pep; the enthusiasm for the day? Have you forgotten what the enthusiasm for the day even feels like? Are you going through the motions, getting the next thing done until it is time to go to bed? Maybe it is time you started looking on the bright side.

It might seem too all encompassing to consider that there really are only two choices in this life. There are only two sides. There is a right side and there is a wrong side. There’s a good side and a bad side. There is what is true and everything else is a lie. Incredulous? Surely there is an admixture, a blend. In people, yes. In circumstances, yes. In all of the shades of the world, absolutely. But, don’t get it twisted. There are only two sides. We just find ourselves dabbling on both ends. That which isn’t sucking us in is frightening us out. Pulled and pushed all day long. Bewildered? Confused? It isn’t the existence of the wrong side causing all the trouble. It is our sheer determination to keep looking at it. Not looking on the bright side. The side where the sun is always shining. Where every dark cloud has a silver lining. Where there is every answer, every solution, all healing and all restoration. That place. Love’s address. The wrong and the bad and the evil will continue on wreaking havoc, maiming, destroying, hurting and torturing, whether you pay attention to it or not. It is what it does. Your job, my responsibility, our task is to stop looking at it. Do you know what I mean? Stop examining the negative, dark side of life. Cease from trying to pin down your oddity, your quirks, your whim. You will never capture nor figure out the darkness. Instead you will become embroiled in it and sink lower as a result. Halt from looking for the bad in every good; waiting for the other shoe to drop; looking for the one wrong part. It’s not inquiry it’s sickness. It is training heavily engrained and made habitual. Your life isn’t over on the dark side. Look on the bright side.

Two distinct choices leave you with a choice. Where will your focus be? What will you look at the most? Can you see the good in things? Look around your home or wherever you are right now. Nothing good going on around you? Nothing you can see that you may want to be thankful for? Is it warm enough? Is your stomach full? Which big screen are you watching later? Work in the morning? You just can’t take all this stuff for granted. Do you have people to love and people who love you? Does someone worry about you? Maybe your life ain’t so bad. Possibly you are smack dab in the middle of a full blown miracle and you keep missing it because you keep choosing to consider the wrong stuff. You choose to stay your mind on the infinite number of things that could go wrong and the more you consider them, the more plausible they appear. Or your option of choice is to drag your mind back through every negative, sour, hurtful thing anyone ever did to you, not to heal it, but to gash it back open with its associated pain. All the causal results of choosing to keep looking at the dark side, where it’s dark, where no answers are, where no one can see where they are going, where nothing good ever happens, ever did happen or ever will happen! All skillfully and masterfully averted by changing your gaze back over to the bright side.

Lately, I noticed myself being a little more cynical than I should be. A bit negative and quick to speak rude truth, that isn’t really truth. On the edge a little, ready to go at a moment’s notice. Looking for what is wrong and generally other developing bad attitudes. And so as I’m asking you, I asked myself. What happened man? Who quelled the most positive man in the world? Who snubbed out whose flame a little? What happened? Looking at the wrong stuff from the wrong side. Looking for love in all the wrong places – well maybe not that, but it fit. (smile) Choosing to look at what isn’t instead of what is. Obsessing over what I need while forgetting what I have already have. Being highly blessed yet forgetful of it. The life I want and the life you want can only be found on the bright side. It never goes away. It just gets obscured from our vision from time to time. Change your mind my friend. Look in a different direction. You will be so glad that you did. Life is good. Look on the bright side.

Just some good thoughts…