If you were to imagine a snow globe around your body, providing you with a safe environment all around you wherever you go, what emotions would you fill your snow globe with? In other words, what weather would you create in your world?
And from this safe space inside your personal snow globe, all the chaos and craziness of the external world would just ping on the outside of the hard plastic shell, unable to touch your inner peace and calm inside your snow globe.
This is what it’s like to live in the world when you take charge of your internal emotional environment, when you recognize that no one has the power to make you feel anything you don’t want to feel. You are able, no matter what the external situation, to fill your personal snow globe with whatever emotions you want to experience.
Here’s an example: Sherry’s aunt was dying of cancer. Both she and her aunt knew the time was drawing near when her aunt would pass from this world. And they were both at peace about it.
Sherry’s cousin (her aunt’s daughter) was not at peace. She was running around talking to the nurses and doctors, demanding more of this or less of that, checking into all the details of her mom’s care, and generally feeling filled with anxiety and fear.
So while her cousin was busy, Sherry sat on her aunt’s bed and they held hands and talked for hours. They laughed and shared, recounting many wonderful memories. They cleared up any remaining misunderstandings, and just loved each other. It was a very special and magical time for them both.
When Sherry’s aunt passed, Sherry felt a tiny bit sad, but mostly she felt happy. Sherry was happy she had taken time off work to spend a week sitting and talking to her aunt; she was happy her aunt had a good life and was ready to transition; she was happy they had such wonderful memories and that they’d had a chance to say goodbye to each other. In so many ways, Sherry was celebrating her aunt’s life.
Unfortunately, Sherry’s cousin was grief-stricken for she had been so busy chasing the medical staff around that she had not allowed herself to see that her mom was really dying. Sherry’s cousin had never taken the time to sit and say goodbye to her mother, and somehow her mother’s passing seemed like a surprise to her. So she was grieving because she didn’t have enough time; she didn’t get to say goodbye; there was much left unsaid, etc.
Clearly, these women were in different positions (one was a niece, one was a daughter) — but if we set that part aside and just look at how they chose to experience the passing of a loved one, we can see two very different experiences. They each created those experiences based on how they chose to feel within their personal snow globes.
Sherry chose connection, celebration and happiness. Sherry’s cousin chose anxiety, fear, and grief. These are two ends of the spectrum and provide us with a great way to see how different our experience can be, depending upon how we choose to feel about something.
Knowing this, what weather will you create in your personal snow globe?
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