This Is Not About You

A long time ago some good friend's I shared a house with were having a problem. I immediately started wracking my brain for what I had done to create the problem and in speaking to one of them I starting doing the "check" - was it something I said, was it this, was it that, etc...until she literally yelled at me at the top of her lungs: "This is not about you!!!" After reeling from the shock and dealing with various reactions of fear, anger, frustration, and sadness, I began evaluating the statement "This is not about you," until I could take it to the place of the possibility that maybe it really wasn't about me.

This one episode has created much food for thought in my life. How often do we go about things assuming it's about us? In personal relationships, work relationships, impersonal interactions - often we are looking at the way another person is acting, reacting, or being and assuming that it's about us.

It's not. In fact, at any given time how a person is being is NOT about you. No matter what you are saying or doing, a person's response is a person's response - THEIR response, not yours. And no matter what they are doing, THEY are doing it, it truly is NOT about you.

This separation is vitally important for two very distinct reasons: The first is that it gives you distance and with distance, situations become so much clearer than when you are in the heat of the moment. The second is because it teaches compassion. It's not about YOU, it's about someone else and the situation is calling for you to be compassionate, to understand that it's the other person having whatever problem they are having, and that they are very likely in serious need of your prayers, your support, and your love. Regardless of how situations turn out.

In my situation, the friendship did not last beyond another year or two. I learned that lesson, but their problems took them in another direction. But the valuable part of the lesson was that I could learn - it wasn't about me!

Blessings and love!
- Darshan




© 2010 Darshan F Jessop