"It is not what happens to us that determines our reality, it is how we interpret it. We have control over our perceptions, decisions and actions - not so much outer events. What we may initially see as a challenge, a setback, or a pain, or terrible can later turn out to be a turning point in our lives.
Even in that moment opportunity emerges for those that look.
But why have the wisdom of the ages with the aging process when we can look at our challenge with new eyes and discover the other side of the perceptual equation and discover a meaning at first missed without the aging process. If you never look and you just keep running the story of being a victim of outer circumstances you delay the discovery of the opportunity to be a master. Every event has two sides.
Wisdom is discovering the whole and objective not the part and subjective only. Our resilience and adaptability is remarkable once we ask the wise questions and extract our a deeper meaning out of our apparent chaos. So, in turn, our terrific experiences have another side and the wise individual does not become carried away by outer appearances and recenters themselves with poise.
Just because we have not looked for and seen the two sides of the equation does not mean they are not synchronously there for our learning and growth."
-Dr. John Demartini