Positive Thinking ... or not

I read an article this morning before my T'ai Chi Chih practice called The Limitations of Positive Thinking. Its thesis set me to thinking (neither positive nor negative thinking, I might add).

Of course, we talk about this topic often in our T'ai Chi Chih class discussions on Buddha's Brain. But, somehow, this article by a Professor Srikumar Rao explained the situation in a way that finally made absolute, undeniable sense. I quote from Prof. Rao's article, printed at www.dailygood.org/view.php?sid=109 below:

     Positive thinking is so firmly enshrined in our culture that knocking it is a little like attacking motherhood or apple pie....

     Perhaps the statement that best exemplifies positive thinking is 'When life hands you a lemon, make lemonade.' ...

     No matter what happens to us in life we tend to think of it as 'good' or 'bad.' And most of us tend to use the 'bad' label three to ten times as often as the 'good' label. And when we say something is bad, the odds grow overwhelming that we will experience it as such....

     Now let's propose something radical and revolutionary. Let's propose that, no matter what happens to you, you do not stick a bad thing label on it. No matter what. You are fired from your job ... your mortgage lender sends you a foreclosure notice ... your spouse files for divorce ... or whatever. This seems so far-fetched as to be laughable. Of course these are horrible tragedies and terrible things to happen. Or are they? Is it possible, just possible, that you have been conditioned to think of these happenings as unspeakable tragedies and hence experience them as such? ...

     Many ... never label what they go through as bad and lament over it. They simply take it as a given as if they were a civil engineer surveying the landscape through which a road is to be built. In this view, a swamp is not a bad thing. It is merely something that has to be addressed in the construction plan....

     Can you actually go through life without labeling what happens to you as good or bad?                                     

Whew. That's a terrific question. And that's also something we learn from our T'ai Chi Chih practices. If you feel as if you had a 'bad' T'ai Chi Chih practice, how willing will you be to return to your practice the next day, or the next?

I'm as guilty of this propensity to judge as anyone. Yet, I also realize that my daily TCC practices consistently orient me toward a kinder, gentler, and more compassionate approach to life: To simply be with what is as it is. Needless to say, I continue to learn and grow.

That's what I find so compelling and refreshing about a T'ai Chi Chih practice. It releases me into a spaciousness of being where everything (acceptable or not) is accepted. No judgment. No good or bad. I simply flow into the moment with All That Is and I am overcome with peacefulness.