Be Gracious

I have been struggling with defining this goal, and what it means to be gracious. I’m thinking that if one can be gracious in rush hour traffic, that’s a pretty good start. When I initially added this goal, I didn’t think I could do it. It’s not that I get road rage or anything, but my blood pressure definitely gets a bump.

I was on the phone with my mother while she was waiting in line to get gas. The woman she was waiting for started to back up, and I asked my mom if she had to go. She said no, but then proceeded to swear at the woman, call her names, and honk her horn for about the next 2 minutes. Then she told me she had to go.

While this seemed to be out of character for my mother, and I don’t know the whole story, I really thought she was acting like a jerk. Now, whenever I find myself getting upset, I think of how she was acting, and I feel instantly calmer.

Gracious or not, I don’t really want to be a jerk.

I have a couple of friends who are achieving a goal I really really really wanted and tried the bejeebers to get, and circumstance after circumstance arose to keep it from happening. Now honestly I am depressed over it (if I was a drinking alcoholic I could be accepted by these people, but I alas will stay in recovery).

So I am not accepted in AA because I am a witch, and not really accepted in the pagan community because I choose to be sober. Words cannot describe how depressed I get sometimes over this quandary. One coven demanded I deny my gods even (“all gods are one”: now if I believed that I would belong to many other religions that would certainly make things easier). My former HPs straight out told me that she was now a Christian and I’d better get on board. No, no, no.

I love my gods, I love sobriety, and I love being a witch. Yet there is really no face-to-face community that will accept all those things about me. Another friend has decided to become Christian and has completely changed for the stranger side of behavior, and started acting abusively so I cut him out of my life (drugs are involved in his case too). I was asked to leave a pagan chat board for alcoholics that I really didn’t offend anyone except one Christian (and I looked over what I said, and it wasn’t offensive, and why oh why is a Christian on a pagan 12 step chat board anyway, and for cryin’ out loud, she and I backchanneled a lot and got along fine, I thought). And I left graciously, and politely, after apologizing to everyone for something I didn’t do, and still don’t quite understand. (I have no problems with Christians, I’m all for something that makes people happy, I just am not Christian myself.)

It really does seem easier for all these other people in the community, it seems like roadblocks are placed in front of me. I just they make me stronger, but sometimes I get tired. I am in mourning for these people, places, opportunities cut out of my life recently. But I trust in the gods and this will pass, and I can act better than I feel: fake it till I make it.

But how does this make me Gracious? I am truly happy for those people I know that are moving on and getting all sorts of things, and keep my mouth shut except to DH, who understands. And I tell my friends how happy I am for them, and don’t let them know the sadness, as that is manipulative.

It is what it is: it cannot be otherwise. sigh.

Edit I just had an epiphany while looking this over: the purpose of these whole things, both my pagan world and AA, is to honor my gods, not to make friends, which is a purely social goal. I want a spiritual one, working with my gods. So naturally, people will come and go, as my level and needs change, and I just need to remember to focus on that, not the ever-changing people and my ego demands. And a spiritual goal is indeed to be Gracious, compassionate (both to myself and others), and strive for Wisdom. Okey-dokey. AA describes it as “placing principals before personalities.”

So it all makes more sense now, I’m glad I wrote it down. I feel so much better.

wow haven’t really been this at all lately….
Gracious-being characterized by charm, good taste, and generosity of

I don’t think this is a good thing. I really want to focus on “live and let live”. Example: I have a friend who has a major crush on a guy with a live-in girlfriend. She oohs and ahhs at his phone calls and visits, while I just keep saying: “he has a girlfriend, you can do better than this.” She says I am too passionate about this. (I just keep thinking of the duped girlfriend, who I don’t even know.)

Now my husband has pointed out the some of her closer friends have very weird relationship stuff so this might seem wonderful for her, and a single guy who’s emotionally available is a turn-off. I bet he’s right. So live and let live.

I can just be nice, and change the subject to something else. That’s being gracious, and that’s what I really want here. As far as everyone else, I’m doing pretty well here.

I have this ability to be…harsh. Now I don’t mean to be, but I blurt things out sometimes in an overly emotional way that always looks rather bad.

I want to be one of those gracious refined folks who just tend to be nicer. They don’t blurt out. There are lots of great descriptions of that from others here who have done/are doing that goal. I think of a file sanding down the rough edges.

Watching President-elect Obama for the past year really shows me graciousness in action, he is just so well-spoken, even-tempered, takes things in stride.

Specific things being gracious will mean to me:
-Approach every difficulty as a test of graciousness
-Seek more spiritual counsel and listen to it
-Keep busy, which makes me happier…live up to my purpose
-Patience and kindness with others, i.e. not dropping snide comments to ex-boyfriends intended to provoke scraps of attention
-Never, ever complain about anything. Even dogs can do that.
-GRATITUDE. My life is too awesome for words.

Had a birthday last week and went out of my way to try to scuttle the surprise plans of the people I work with. Plan backfired, so instead of 1 day of ‘happy birthday’, I had 3 days of bday related events….

...be thoughtful of others but true to myself.

What an appropriate way to trade three goals for one.

don’t yell at the servers…even when they’re petty and immature and make me want to pull my hair out…..yelling in this case is wrong….

I used to let people use me and walk all over me because I was afraid to set boundaries. Somewhere between then and now, i grew a spine and it’s been awesome. I can be firm and at the same time gracious. Yesterday I had the opportunity to be gentle and kind, and it had a fabulous outcome.

yayhoo!