Surviving Life in the Tribes... Loving It

Life in the tribes requires humility for we all make mistakes.

Humility in this sense is self-forgiveness as we think not too much of the necessary embarrassments that come our way out of these mistakes.

Take a drive on a busy road any time soon and you’ll soon see people make silly mistakes—we all do. We make mistakes everywhere, every day. If we don’t handle these mistakes with an appropriate level of humility we cruel ourselves unnecessarily. And if that’s not bad enough this will also end up having a negative effect on others, ironically, as our self-directed castigations somehow spew uncontrollably over others—worst of all, at the least desired moments!

So, humility—manifested as self-forgiveness—is critically important.

This humility doesn’t sweat the small stuff that happens “to” us. Indeed, it takes a quiet, unannounced pleasure at its own mistakes, learning to smile wryly inside, even to the point of having a laugh about the silly mistakes it makes. It knows mistakes are generally nothing really, and a simple, authentic “sorry” where the mistake applies to others sorts 99 percent of it instantly.

Humility doesn’t resent; it accepts.

We need to draw resilience out of our days so as to ‘live the next.’ We can easily not deal with our “stuff,” especially on a level beneath the conscious thought that feels okay. But subconsciously we feel it; it affects us if we deny. Somehow. It’s important to be honest with ourselves, rejecting propositions to deny.

It is a necessary attribute for not only success and happiness in the tribes; it provides the gateway to peace of soul.

And this is most certainly the crux of living. It underpins everything, not least of which our relationships. What is success and happiness without a sound foundation at our innermost spiritual level? It’s short-term success that neglects our long-term wellbeing. Like a stack of dominoes we’ll start to tumble eventually. Of course, we know this.

In life, stay grounded. Forgive yourself. Don’t take yourself, your life, your relationships, your happiness, your success—or anything—too seriously. Sure, it’s important. But life is full of surprises. Following along with the flow of life is more important than the detail which always threatens to swallow us whole.

In life, with this approach, we will stumble but we don’t need to fall. And stumbling can also become fun; certainly nothing that fears us.

© 2010 S. J. Wickham.