POWER OVER YOUR MOOD

 Your feeling is something that you are confronted with everyday. Sometimes you feel good and sometimes for no reasonable explanation you wake up one morning feeling grumpy and you go through the day with that ill tempered feeling, leaving everybody to wonder why you carry along the way you do. Sometimes we call it waking up on the wrong side of the bed. If you find out you woke up on the wrong side of the bed, you can easily correct that.  Go back to bed and wake up on the right side.

Your feeling is subject to your decision. There is no one who has power over your feeling like you do. Don’t allow anything decide your mood negatively. No matter what went wrong decide to remain in the best of mood. Sometimes it is not easy to maintain your cool when things went awry. You would want to scream your head off or fly off the handle in extreme cases. And most of the time we tell ourselves that we just couldn’t help it. But the truth is this, you can help it. You can be a master over your emotion.

You are meant to control your emotion and not the other way round. One thing I have discovered about foul mood is that it fouls everything around you.

Your feeling can take so much from you and it can also add so much to your life. Negative emotions take away from you while positive feeling energizes you. You will accomplish much when you are on a high plane of enthusiasm than when you are in the valley of sadness. What you lose in a split seconds of negative display of emotion is usually enormous. It will take a longer time to restore it and in extreme cases the damage would be permanent. Take for instance, in one moment of anger you could do something that you will regret for the rest of your life. The Sacred Book of Wisdom Opine, “Be angry, but don’t allow your anger lead you to sin.”

Bitterness, hatred, depression are all negative emotions that are harmful when you indulge in them.No wonder the greatest book of Wisdom says not to allow the root of bitterness spring up lest many be defiled. And it takes much to indulge in negative feelings than in positive emotions. In my own opinion it takes less to love than to hate. It takes less to forgive than to live in bitterness. It takes less to be happy than to be depressed and sad. It takes so much energy to frown than to put a smile on your face. So it is wisdom to go for what takes less yet highly productive than to go for what takes much but destructive.

You must make a decision to determine your mood. Don’t allow circumstances decide them for you. And this begins in the morning when you wake up. The psalmist puts it this way in the Ancient Book of Wisdom, "This is the day that the Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad..." Don’t allow the fact that you were hurt by someone keep you in perpetual gloom. No one is worth having such power over your life. You will have to make a choice to feel right and good in spite of the hurt. It is your right to feel good. Even though you have no inclination to feel good, just feel good anyway. Don’t allow anyone or anything take that away from you. You are the master of your own emotion.

Fred Egba

THE CRISES OF THE AGE

A life of comfort never comes to those who just sit down with crossed legs; it is something you must be willing to work for.

All that Tunde has ever done in life was to live in the perimeter of wishes and the pathetic thing about this kind of life is that wishes would never put a beggar on the back of a horse. Tired of the way he was living, Tunde decided to break out of the cocoon of illusory wishes that has never taken him beyond where he had been for several years. He wants the status of his life to change. And so he made up his mind that it was time to seek solution, so that his stagnation, failures and poverty would become the specter of the past.

He approached a wise man that was compassionate enough to open his mind to certain truth about life and the way He has been living.

THE WISDOM.

“Tunde, I have known you for several years now and I am going to be frank with you, since you have come to me to seek help. Let us begin at this point: Your greatest problem in life is that you have been seeking for some shortcuts to the kind of life that you desire. Whatever is worth the while in life does not come through that way. You need to understand that what you don’t patiently work for in this life will never come to you, in the measure that you desire and it will be forever elusive to you. An easy life is worked for. It is something you earn through the process of time.”

He stopped to look at Tunde if he was following. Having satisfied himself that Tunde was following from the expression on his face, he continued.

“If you want the good life, you must take the responsibility of creating it. Sitting down and hoping that some day some kind of fortune would fall into your lap from the blues is to live in deception. It is written in the Sacred Book of Wisdom thus: ‘Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.’ This is a very huge responsibility placed on you. Tunde, you destiny is in your hand. And you must understand that all that you need to create a comfortable life for yourself and others around you have already been made available to you through the vast resources of life that can be found everywhere.”

Tunde’s face was a mask of contemplation as he listened to the words of the wise man.

“My greatest problem with this generation is that we don’t want to work for anything. We want to wave a magic wand and let things happened on their own and fast too. You need to know that the reward of labour comes through diligence. ‘A man who is diligent in his business will stand before kings and not before men of low estate’ says the Sacred Book of Wisdom.

Life is in phases, my friend. Learn to work with each phase you find yourself. Don’t get caught in the crises of impatience. It has destroyed many lives. Those who have pursued shortcuts have had their lives cut short. There is nothing like overnight success. It only happens over time.”

The wise man adjusted himself and post a question to Tunde.

“Tunde, do you get admitted into school in one day and graduate the next day.”

Tunde shook his head. It was as an absolute impossibility.

“Life does not start at the top. It begins from somewhere. Even the earth was not created in one day. It took God some time to put together everything you see today. Although it is stated that it took six days for God to complete the work of the earth, I believe it took him six thousand years. You know why? A thousand years is like a day to Him. Do you now understand the mathematics?”

Tunde’s face registered his surprise.

“Well, I’m just trying to let you know that nothing really comes cheap. You work and pay a price for it. What you see around me today is not a product of just one day. It took some hard work and patience to get to where I am today. And that is the way I’m showing you. Take one step at a time and keep putting one foot forward and you will get to your desired destination.”

Tunde sighed.

The words of the wise man are true. He thought about his own life. He has never been the patient type. He made up his mind that no matter what happen, he would take responsibility for his life. The world does not have respect for mediocrity. He would start from somewhere. Though the steps are small now, he believes it will result into a giant leap later. 

 Fred Egba