This week, I came back to the realization and acceptance that I was an alchemist. Not a literal one though… But I am an alchemist in the idea of creating something positive from neutral or negative things. I think it comes from the way I look at life. The beauty of it is that everyone can be one too!

I first came with the idea a year or so ago. When I decided it was time for me to be done with all the negativity I could feel, coming from within or from outside. I was done, period. If it could affect me, it meant that I could recognize it. So I learned to recognized the schemes. Then I had to decide what to do with this feeling of negativity. I could shield and prevent it to reach me (which means I just ignored them). I could absorb them and learn from them. I could let them reach me deeper and then work on it in order to release it changed, charged with positivity. So for a year, I practiced, and I am now an alchemist. I neutralize negativity or change it into positivity. And it makes me feel good, peaceful.

I am fully aware life is not about unicorns and singing flowers on the side walk. I often feel uncomfortable reading articles on how to make your life more positive, on kindness, on positive communication…. because they are often so judgemental that they give us a guilt feeling, even if we are not that bad…. to me, they just tend to replace a system with another. And to be honest, I find most of them hypocritical and far from reality. It’ just my opinion on the subject. The way I feel reading or listening to people promoting this kind of thing. I can also see their perverse effect on a regular basis on people around me. Overreaction, self-censorship, low or rocket high self esteem (depending on the ability to successfully apply the principles or not…), strong belief to hold the only and universal truth, proselytism, judgemental approach of people…. for the best part… I also see a strong feeling of inadequacy, a rejection of anything or anyone not following the same path, and a huge hypocrisy when it comes to hide what isn’t that positive in life…

An ideology, period.

Thing is, life is about balance. We need light in our life, but we truly acknowledge its value when we see it standing out of the darkness. We can spend our life running from anything that may hurt us, or we can face it and learn from it. We can deny the usefulness of negativity in any realm of our life. Or we can be grateful for it, as it gives us the opportunity to grow. Adversity, jealousy, unfairness, misunderstanding, power thrust, anxiety, stress, lack of empathy…. are some of these negative ideas we all have to deal with, sooner of later.

Anyway, the way I see this in my life is quite simple. If I feel something is ‘wrong’, if something or someone makes me feel uncomfortable, I try to determine what really makes me feel this way. It can be anything I just listed above, or anything else. It can come from a person or even from a place where it sunk so deep that it’s everywhere. Anyway, it rings a bell within and then I have to decide if I can do something or if it doesn’t relies on me. And I act accordingly. I can shield myself to protect my own way of feeling from it, or I can unleash my own energy and raise my vibes to a positive, peaceful, energetic level, and let them do the job, with a simple smile on my face, letting them clear the way. I can also listen to people and uplift them, or just absorb their stress and anxiety to release them later, elsewhere (the lake is my friend on this matter!).

Thing is, I am not passive on the subject. I do it willingly (I could only ignore it and deal with this little life of mine). I do it because I want to, and that I can do it. People may be aware of it or not, it doesn’t matter. I do it because, to me, it’s the thing to do. And that it brings me happiness.

As to my own inner negativity, I learned to simply acknowledge it, accept it and listen to what it has to teach me… Most of the times, it’s a matter of lack of alignment between what I wanted to achieve and what I really have done… Self pressure… I learned to let go and focus on what really matters: what IS. Same thing with my way of dealing with frustration… which is not good at all but I am working on it by learning patience… Not waiting for things to happen… but to go on, doing what I have to do while everything works on its own to make them happen. I am not standing by in the expectation that something will happen. I am acting, probably making the path for things to happen when and where they are supposed to. And I think that I finally integrated the idea of patience. And letting go.

It’s freeing, to be an alchemist, you know. We don’t hold energies, they don’t act on us, we do on them, we work with them and release knowingly those we feel to release when we feel to release them. We have the strength to absorb negativity and to change it into something that will bring peace, happiness, strength too, to other people. They may not notice it, and it doesn’t matter. But we can see change occur, and enjoy it too.

And it all begins with being aware of our own feelings, being aware of ourself.

So this week, be an alchemist too!

motif: Panzee