2 white wolves

How “Choice” reveals our quality of life

Here is some great Cherokee Indian wisdom:

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life…
“A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy. “It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves.”

“One is evil – he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.”

“The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith.”

“The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person, too.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

Some of us grew up being taught to feed the negative wolfmyself included.  It is habitual. We can get so busy with our lives that we don’t even realize we are in that negative, downward cycle.  Yet, where does it take us?

It keeps us from being who we really are and living a life of joy, peace and freedom.  It keeps us wallowing in our own self-imposed suffering.

Which wolf shows up in your life? As the wise Cherokee Grandfather says, both are there!  The real question is “Which one do you feed?”

What if next time we gave the evil wolf none or very little of our own energy? What if we chose not to feed him?

Just pretend an actual wolf appears in your back yard.  If there is nothing for him to eat, he will go away on his own looking for food in other areas.  So common sense tells us that the wolf (thoughts/emotions) we don’t feed will go away. By not feeding our negative emotions, we will soon go back to our natural state of calm on our own. No effort is involved; there is nothing we have to do or nothing we have to change about ourselves.  It simply starts with our personal “choice” of which wolf we want to feed.  And better yet, the more we feed the good wolf, the more he/she hangs around leaving us in a clearer and neutral frame of mind and present to deal with pertinent matters at hand. When we are neutral, the filter we see things through is more clean and unbiased, and we are able to be open and curious. I think most would agree that the reward of this latter choice could be priceless!

I am honored to know so many friends, colleagues and even acquaintances that continue to choose to feed the good wolf the majority of the time.

Cheers and love to each of you … no matter what wolf you choose to feed,

JoAnne

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