I find myself resisting a lot these days. Resisting just about everything in life. These past three years I have felt I had no choice but to accept things that have happened in my life and I have to say I feel pretty ripped off about that from time to time.

So Boo Hoo right? I know there are multitudes of people out there who deal with challenges far greater than mine every day and don’t even make a peep about it.

My friend E.D. says one must replace resistance and negativity with love and whenever the negative makes its way into your life, immediately think of something loving.

“But that’s too hard…” I whine!

“It’s your choice” she replies.

She’s not the only one it would seem. Years ago E.D. suggested I read a book by Dan Millman titled “Way of the Peaceful Warrior” of which the following quotes come from…

Pain is a relatively objective, physical phenomenon; suffering is our psychological resistance to what happens. Events may create physical pain, but they do not in themselves create suffering. Resistance creates suffering. Stress happens when your mind resists what is...The only problem in your life is your mind's resistance to life as it unfolds.

Every positive change--every jump to a higher level of energy and awareness--involves a rite of passage. Each time to ascend to a higher rung on the ladder of personal evolution, we must go through a period of discomfort, of initiation. I have never found an exception.

If you don't get what you want, you suffer; if you get what you don't want, you suffer; even when you get exactly what you want, you still suffer because you can't hold on to it forever. Your mind is your predicament. It wants to be free of change. Free of pain, free of the obligations of life and death. But change is a law, and no amount of pretending will alter that reality.

You haven't yet opened your heart fully, to life, to each moment. The peaceful warrior's way is not about invulnerability, but absolute vulnerability--to the world, to life, and to the Presence you felt. All along I've shown you by example that a warrior's life is not about imagined perfection or victory; it is about love. Love is a warrior's sword; wherever it cuts, it gives life, not death.

When we feel stuck, going nowhere--even starting to slip backward--we may actually be backing up to get a running start.

Perhaps I need to revisit that book again.