InnerBliss: You Can Call Me PissedChick

We all have shadow sides to our personalities. It is only in contrast to our own darkness that we can explore and know and share our light. And it is dangerous to ignore this fact about ourselves -- it leads to acting out or repressing or exploding.

You can call my shadow side PissedChick. And over the last week, she has been rearing her dark and somewhat unattractive head a little too often for my own taste.

PissedChick usually emerges because I'm not taking care of myself. She is a direct result of my own actions; she comes from inside, in other words.

Like I don't do yoga when I know I should. I eat food that I know makes me feel like crap. I watch too much "television" (in our case, DVD's on our computer). I read too much news. I read too much trashy fiction. These are all signs and symptoms.

So, yes, over the past two weeks, I've not done enough yoga; I've eaten a bit of wheat here and there, knowing it exhausts me and makes me feel slightly depressed; I've watched too much TV; I've not journaled. Sure, all of that is bad enough.

BUT this time one of the main stresses has come from the outside. Aaarrgghh! As Charlie Brown would say, because I have no control.

And yes, I am talking about my technology difficulties. (Cough -- Verizon sucks -- cough)

The most interesting part of this for me has been my reaction to it.

And this is how we get to know ourselves better, right? This is how we become more intimately acquainted with our dark side. This is the only way we can then put the light saber to it (said the geek).

My reaction first was to feel stressed, angry. Typical.

But then PissedChick decided to direct all of that negative energy at BlissChick.

PissedChick decided it must be the universe telling BlissChick that she wasn't, after all, called to write or tell stories.

PissedChick decided that BlissChick was ridiculous to believe in her dreams.

Though my BlissChick was tempted to believe all this negativity, she must have absorbed more than I ever thought from yoga and all my other spiritual endeavors because she decided PissedChick was wrong.

So today, I am thinking about how important it is to constantly be reminding ourselves what it is about us that is good and worthwhile and unique.

It is so important that every single day -- once we have found our bliss -- that we not only work toward it but that we do something to honor it.

We need mantras that we put on repeat loops in our brains until they are fully absorbed by our hearts.

And we need other people who remind us too -- as did a couple of my readers, for whom I am so grateful.

"Constant Effort," the Dalai Lama calls it. And constant does not mean every other day or every other minute.

Constant means constant. So take that, PissedChick!