“If you wish to experience peace, provide peace for another.” — Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama
I love Gandhi’s philosophy: “Be the change you wish to see in the world”. To me, it applies to global thinking as well as to the little moments in our lives and relationships that we encounter every day.
In relationship counseling, I see that one partner often experiences the lack of what they want from the other, and they’re painfully aware of that lack. Sometimes, this awareness leads to the discovery that what they themselves are missing is exactly what they are also not providing. So both parties are trying to survive in the deficit.
Start at home. What are you missing? If you want more peace, how can you provide more peace? If you want more love, are you offering love? If you want more fun, are you offering fun? When we provide for the other that which we are missing ourselves, something shifts. The deficit becomes abundance. It was within our power all along. We just needed to turn the mirror toward ourselves. We needed to be the change.