Feeding the good wolf
Written by hootenannie on March 29th, 2007So, this is where the rubber meets the road. I’ve set up this site, and had lots of thoughts like, “Yeah, this is going to be GREAT!” I’ve chosen my font and my background color (disclaimer: both subject to change at any time), and alerted the public that we’re in business.
And now. What to write about?
How about bitterness. I guess that’s just as good a place to start as any. A real “upper,” and really, who doesn’t want to immerse themselves in the topic of rancor and venom?
Here we go.
Native American folklore includes the story of a man who struggles between good and evil, positive living and negative destruction, building up and tearing down. He tells his son that he has two wolves fighting within his heart: a good wolf and a bad wolf. His son’s eyes grow large as he asks, “Which one will win?” The father replies, “Whichever one I feed.”
Throughout my life, I have had a tendency to bow toward bitterness. Whenever life dealt me disappointment, I went one rung further down on the ladder toward cynicism and despair. I started to wholeheartedly believe that God had it out for me, and that I should just go ahead and expect failure and misery. It’s easier that way – low expectations leave no room for the shock of the anticlimax. It’s not that I saw the glass half empty; on the contrary, I saw it half full… of poison.
The tricky thing about bitterness is that in the end, it only hurt me. I was down all the time, and pulling others down in the process. Oh sure, cynicism allowed for some witty comments, and people were often drawn to my “realism.” I stated things exactly as I saw them, compulsively wrung all buoyancy out of situations, and thus maintained control over my life and circumstances. Don’t get your hopes up, and you’ll never be let down, I thought. Do not want. Do not hope. Do not look forward to things. Do not desire. To admit that I wanted something, to admit that something was important to me, was to reveal a vulnerability that I was not comfortable with. And so I chose the safety within the hard shell of petulance.
It’s funny – I think that some people actually want you to be bitter, and so they encourage it. Aren’t you angry? Can you believe he did that? What an ass. It’s not fair! You are SO right to feel that way. Bitterness begets bitterness. Acidity and malice are the natural products of hostility. Let’s all be bitter together. After all, it’s more fun that way – misery loves company.
But enough is enough. Relatively recently, I decided that I didn’t want to be bitter anymore. This came at an unexpected time, a time when I had a lot of reasons to be angry. I had been wronged, and I had been hurt. I had let my guard down for a time, and it came back at me in the form of a bitch-slap to the heart. What better time to positively loathe life?
But no. No more. I do not want to spend my life raging against the world. And so I am learning how to choose joy each and every day. It’s a discipline, and it’s often incredibly difficult. My bitter wolf rears its head on a daily basis, howling for attention and some good lovin’. But instead, I am choosing to foster and strengthen the “good wolf.” And slowly but surely, by the grace of God, this positive force is gaining backbone and resilience. I have so, so many reasons to be joyful.
I am learning how to state what is important to me. I am allowing myself to feel, and to unapologetically desire. And I am hopeful that these dreams will take form someday.
All of this with a smile… and the occasional sneer. :)
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Hi Grown Up Lady Blogger! :) Hurray for one more blog to add to the many I read regularly — you are an excellent writer so I’m looking forward to returning a lot.
And as for “bitterness” I was just having a long discussion with a friend about this topic today at lunch, I’ll have to pass your post along.
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A farmer went out to plant some seed. As he scattered it across his field, some seeds fell on a footpath, and the birds came and ate them. Other seeds fell on shallow soil with underlying rock. The plants sprang up quickly, but they soon wilted beneath the hot sun and died because the roots had no nourishment in the shallow soil. Other seeds fell among thorns that shot up and choked out the tender blades. But some seeds fell on fertile soil and produced a crop that was thirty, sixty, and even a hundred times as much as had been planted.
Been churning up the soil Annie? =)