yeah, as the title implies, i’ve been holding ot my anger to our housemaid for several days already. i think i’m quite nice and kind and i’ve been letting her do things on her own but…the past few days really got into my nerves. she seem to be resting a lot when in fact there are a lot of things to be done like sweeping the floor, arranging the shoes, cleaning the CR and the like…i don’t want to be rude but we don’t pay her just to watch television.
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Closing Cycles by Paulo Coelho
One always has to know when a stage
comes to an end. If we insist on
staying longer than the necessary
time, we lose the happiness and the
meaning of the other stages we have to
go through. Closing cycles, shutting
doors, ending chapters – whatever name
we give it, what matters is to leave
in the past the moments of life that
have finished.
Did you lose your job? Has a loving
relationship come to an end? Did you
leave your parents’ house? Gone to
live abroad? Has a long-lasting
friendship ended all of a sudden? You
can spend a long time wondering why
this has happened. You can tell
yourself you won’t take another step
until you find out why certain things
that were so important and so solid in
your life have turned into dust, just
like that. But such an attitude will
be awfully stressing for everyone
involved: your parents, your husband
or wife, your friends, your children,
your sister, everyone will be
finishing chapters, turning over new
leaves, getting on with life, and they
will all feel bad seeing you at a
standstill.
None of us can be in the present and
the past at the same time, not even
when we try to understand the things
that happen to us. What has passed
will not return: we cannot forever be
children, late adolescents, sons that
feel guilt or rancor towards our
parents, lovers who day and night
relive an affair with someone who has
gone away and has not the least
intention of coming back. Things pass,
and the best we can do is to let them
really go away.
That is why it is so important
(however painful it may be!) to
destroy souvenirs, move, give lots of
things away to orphanages, sell or
donate the books you have at home.
Everything in this visible world is a
manifestation of the invisible world,
of what is going on in our hearts -
and getting rid of certain memories
also means making some room for other
memories to take their place. Let
things go. Release them. Detach
yourself from them. Nobody plays this
life with marked cards, so sometimes
we win and sometimes we lose. Do not
expect anything in return, do not
expect your efforts to be appreciated,
your genius to be discovered, your
love to be understood. Stop turning on
your emotional television to watch the
same program over and over again, the
one that shows how much you suffered
from a certain loss: that is only
poisoning you, nothing else.
Nothing is more dangerous than not
accepting love relationships that are
broken off, work that is promised but
there is no starting date, decisions
that are always put off waiting for
the “ideal moment.” Before a new
chapter is begun, the old one has to
be finished: tell yourself that what
has passed will never come back.
Remember that there was a time when
you could live without that thing or
that person – nothing is
irreplaceable, a habit is not a eed.
This may sound so obvious, it may even
be difficult, but it is very
important.
Closing cycles. Not because of pride,
incapacity or arrogance, but simply
because that no longer fits your life.
Shut the door, change the record,
clean the house, shake off the dust.
Stop being who you were, and change
into who you are.
