LEAVE IT ALONE

     Moods are contagious, and they go both ways. If someone is happy and upbeat, her happiness magnetizes all of the same feelings within me, and I cannot help but be lifted by her joy. And if someone is steeped in darkness and brooding misery, it's hard, if not impossible, to not get pulled down emotionally. Spreading happiness is a gift of life. Sharing honest sorrow is also a gift of life. But spreading martyrdom and self-pity is no gift. It is a scourge. I must learn to protect myself agianst it, and learn not to pour it all over others when I am in that space.
     The challenge, and it's a big one, is to maintain my emotional stability, even if someone around me is being indulgently grouchy or oozing darkness. My instinct is to fuss and fix, but the best thing I can do is to let him be, to let him work it out and find his way back to the light. I can be grounded energy. I can be stable and ok within myself, and that will bring more to the restoration of happiness than hooking in to frantic irritation and stirring the pot to fix the situation. I can walk away and give space and time to the one I love.
     That's what I want when I am dark. That's what restores me. Pressure and fussing make me burst.

 Today, I will leave it alone. I will allow the ones I love to work out their own stuff.