In Tibetan Buddhism, it is believed that peacocks are the only animal that is able to ingest poisonous plants that are toxic to every other being and still survive. In fact, it is believed that the ingested poisons is what creates the vibrant colors of their feathers and what makes them so beautiful on the outside.
Imagine that!? The ability to take in the toxic words, actions and opinions of others and be able to breathe that in and transform it into something beautiful?
This is not new to me as I learned about this years ago and it has become part of my daily internal mantra. Some people over the years have accused me of being too soft or not having a backbone in situations where people are being ugly or petty towards me but the truth is, I have just learned to pick and choose my battles.
Would I love to be petty or revengeful? Omg YES! Just ONCE, I would love to know what it feels like to burrow my way down to their level and know what it’s like to act out of spite, rage or a desire to make people hurt the way that they have hurt me. But, I have never done it and if I made it 43 years without doing it, why break the streak now?
The truth is, I don’t condone those actions. Sometimes I can rationalize through empathy as to why they do what they did, but because I hate what they are doing, why would I want to put myself on the same playing level as them in order to retaliate? In order for me to do that, I would need to burrow myself down to that level of childishness and move backwards. For what? For a momentary high? A short-term feeling of euphoria of some kind?Â
It would only last for a moment and then I would be filled with guilt, shame and beating myself up for much longer than the moment of bliss.
There was a time in my life where I was afraid to speak up. Afraid to stand up to those who bullied me. Afraid to confront those who caused me pain. I am not the same person anymore. I have grown enough thick skin over the years where I can have the hard conversations, speak my truths and opinons and not lose sleep over it. But there is a big different between standing up for yourself and stooping down to another level to prove a point to be malicious.
Over the last 10 years, I have made the conscious decision to ingest those poisons and use it for good. I have used it to self reflect on myself, actions, decisions and who I strive to be. I have used it to gauge patterns in behavior to make me more equipped to notice future patterns. I have used it to broaden my spectrums of compassion for all walks of life, situations and backgrounds to gain more perspective on humanity. And most importantly, I have used those poisons as measurements of strength on what I can endure and overcome without sacrificing my values, my reputation or my character.
There is something so powerful in the ability to know you can destroy someone and making the choice not to do it and go about your day. The level of self control in using rational thought over emotional derailment.
This was not something that I was able to conquer overnight and I am still not perfect at it. I am still human and I have moments of anger and the desires to lash out but I am a firm believer in petty thoughts, not petty actions. I remind myself of that daily.
Sometimes the more poison you ingest without it killing you, the more you attract people who want to continuously feed you. I welcome it because I will continue to spew out love and beauty before I turn into someone I was condemning. Ain’t worth it.
The next time you are faced with a situation, a bad relationship, friendship, work disagreement, whatever toxicity is breaking you down, just remember this.
We need it to be able to stand out. We need it to become vibrant. We need it to be beautiful. We need it to fuel us in some way, learn and grow from it.
We need it to level up ourselves.
We need it for enlightenment.
Next time someone is giving you shit? Tell them to fuck off. You are a peacock and I guess it just meant your colors were a little dim lately and needed to be polished bright again. So thank them for the toxins and recharge those colors so you can soar!
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Namaste Bitches.
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