We are who we choose to be

When we enter a state of mind that is angry, vengeful, that wants to cause hurt, then it causes us heartache. There's something profoundly disturbing to the human being in these discordant states of mind. When we feel heartache, it isn't the external things that cause us to feel it, its those external things prompting an internal reaction. So first and foremost it is what we feel internally that causes us to feel that way. But does that process need to be automatic? Couldn't we decide whether or not we want to let someone else's heartache affect our own? I used to think it was being untrue to yourself to control your states, to choose what you would feel rather than having the things in the world choose for you. But it is the truest form of self, allowing yourself to create those states of mind - rather than letting an element of your external reality define you. I'm torn between what I think will be effective and what I think will be right. I want to be close to her more than anything but I don't know what to do to make it happen. Maybe I'm trying to hard to have something that I just can't make happen. I can only strive to learn, strive to grow and improve myself, maybe then things will come to me. Ironic how in life that which we pursue so often eludes us, but when we stop pursuing - it comes right to us. By chasing something you only drive it further away, maybe its better to stop for a moment and focus on something else. Pain is everywhere in the world, and we choose whether or not we want to feel it. We can have the power to say, I will not hate, I will not be angry, I will not be afraid. We can instead choose an attitude of love, I will give, I will forgive, I will have compassion. Even if the world does not reflect these qualities back to us, we can still possess them within ourselves. Those that I do love have not reflected that love back to me, and thats the world they choose to form, its not mine and I don't have to be a part of it anymore. I will choose to love regardless of the harshness of others actions, and I think thats truly how those who have loved in the past have achieved it so greatly. When the world around them was a dark and cold place, they ignored what they saw and chose to believe in a world of their choosing and thusly that world was formed out of the infinite fount of their love. We all have an infinite influence in the world, the extent of which is unknown to me. But if every day we strive to perform the right action, the right cause, then those small victories accumulated over days result in a lifetime of achievement. There was a martyr named Stephen who as he was stoned to death by the towns people proclaimed, Forgive them lord, for they know not what they do. Those around him only projected a mindset of hate, and it spiralled out of control within them, ultimately destroying their sanity, but he didn't allow it to affect him. He controled that one aspect of the world that he could, himself, choosing to love when others chose to hate. Mother Theresa was surrounded by poverty, and despite the lack that everyone around her was convinced of, she saw abundance, an abundance of spirit that only waited to be harnessed. She chose to encourage that abundance, to believe in her dream more than the reality that surrounded her, and from that illusion she created something real.There are many who do not appreciate, some who even hate, but they cause their own heartache, and those states of mind are theirs to bear. They do not have to be mine, and I do not have to reciprocate. I can choose the mindset of love, even if no one else believes in my dream, I still can.