Another Tool: The "Serenity Prayer."

On this page of the Two Scoops newsletter archive about halfway down under Wednesday), you can find a detailed interpretation of the Serenity Prayer.

If asking God offends you, the author, Ray Whiting, even offers "still another way to begin would be... 'Clear thinking, reason and common sense bring me to Serenity to accept...'"

I have used the Serenity Prayer as a touchstone whenever I feel my life is careening out of control. (And believe me, some days it doesn't take much to get that careening feeling!)

Ray talks about serenity being "...peace...tranquillity. It's a state of inner balance and mental calmness." In the context of the Serenity Prayer, the serenity to accept the things I cannot change simply "means acknowledging the undesirable person, place, thing, or condition exists. It does not mean you have to LIKE something. It doesn't mean you have to open the doors of your life and let it move in. It doesn't mean you must own it for all time. It also doesn't mean you must put up with it forever."

He goes on to talk about courage and the things we can change. "The full scope of things we can change is embraced by a circle described by the length of our arms." Ray describes in detail what we can change, he then talks about how easy it is NOT to change.

When he gets to the part about "how do you find that courage" your pretty well convinced that doing nothing does a lot more harm than good. "When you see the good that will come from a change, the courage to follow through comes more readily." The push you need to get the courage might be right here in this section of his article.

Now we get to the meat of the issue for me, which is "the wisdom to know the difference." Ray has prepared a list of questions to answer. Sometimes, even knowing that I have a choice that I can do one thing differently makes putting one foot in front of the other easier to do.

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