When life gives you a hundred reasons to cry…
show life that you have a thousand reasons to smile.
When I first started my page for The Horse Mafia on facebook (our birthdate is October 10, 2012), I had a friend share something with me. She said,
“As you grow, there are going
to be people who work against you.
People who you think are
your friends will turn out
not to be true friends and
people who you think are your enemies
will turn out to be the ones who help you most.”
It isn’t that I didn’t believe her—I did. But, I didn’t understand the magnitude of what she was saying at all. I mean, after all, you find this out in all areas of life, right? As we go through our daily lives, we get to see who is there during the good times and who is there during the bad times.
When I reached about 500 “likes”, I got my first “bad” email from someone who had just liked the page. In their email, they told me that they had only liked the page long enough to send me an email and as soon as I responded to them, they were going to “unlike” the page. They went on to say that I “shouldn’t be sharing so much positivity and that I should share more about “real life—that life isn’t as rosy as I make it out to be.” This person went on to threaten me to try to shut my page down if I “didn’t get real”. In my mind, I called them a few names (God, please forgive me) and then I banned them. Good riddance, right? Well, I found out later (much later) that this person was someone who had pretended to be my friend. They had created a “fake” account and sent me the message under the fake account name. They made the mistake of telling someone that they did this and this person told me. I was shocked. This happened late in 2012.
I need to stop right here and tell you about all the good, positive emails I get too. I get so many that are uplifting and positive. And I usually get a mega-positive-good one on the day that I get a bad one…keep this in mind while you are reading the below…
…well, you would think that there are very few people out there who will actually threaten you over what you post on your facebook page. But, you know what? It happens more than you would ever think. I have someone who reports every one of my prayers as “spam”. Every. Single. One. And I think they have several account names and they sign in under each name and report each prayer as spam. Why? Who knows? Maybe they don’t believe in God. Maybe they don’t believe in any higher power. Maybe they don’t believe in prayer. Maybe they’re offended by how I pray. Maybe they think prayer should be silent. Maybe they are just mean. Maybe they are just spiteful and want to create chaos. Who knows?!
Well, today I got one of “those emails.” It wasn’t about the prayer I put up. It wasn’t really about any one specific post. It was an “in general” email. They went on and on and on and on about how I post too much stuff about “la-la-land”. How there is no way that I am thatpositive…that I must be living in a vacuum or a bubble or wearing rose-colored glasses…they actually called me some names. Told me how stupid I must be to think that there are people out there who need “my kind of inspiration”. They ended the email with threatening to try to shut my page down.
My immediate thought was that they are a miserable, hurting person. They are in extreme pain. I recognize that and I accept that. I have to pray for this person and let go of the feelings that will take hold if I don’t let it go. So, that is what I have chosen to do. I know you are reading this blog. You, the person who sent me the email. I just want you to know that I understand you are hurting. I just want you to know that you can’t hurt me. And I forgive you. There is something else I want you to know:
I don’t live in la-la-land. I don’t live in a fairy tale. I don’t live in a vacuum. I don’t live in a bubble. I don’t wear rose-colored glasses. I’m living day-to-day life, choosing to see the good in others. There is a lot of negativity out there. But, in my world, I see more positive, more good than bad. Because I choose to see it. I choose to smile, I chooseto laugh, I choose to be happy. Yes, there are things every day that could make me cry. And sometimes I give in to it. I just sit at my desk sometimes and have a good, ol’ soul-cleansing cry. I believe a good cry helps renew you. But, my crying doesn’t last very long…because just as surely as I have 1 thing to cry about, there are 10 things that make me smile.
Happiness is a choice. It is a conscious decision. You can choose to be negative, bitter, resentful, jealous or hating. Or you can choose happiness.
You can show life that you are unhappy or you can show life that you have 1,000 reasons to smile. I choose the smiling side of life…
Blessings to you!
Charity & The Horse Mafia
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