Confederation and meat consumption

[rva_jeremy]

Taking offense is a great message to self. When I feel myself taking offense at anything, it is a signal to me to find my part in the exchange or event. Just as soon as I turn my attention in that direction, I feel the sense of being offended melt away. So being offended is useful to us. It is an opportunity to look at ourselves, not point the finger outward. But if we follow through with the natural tendency to point blame outwardly (only) to that which has ignited the feeling of being offended, the whole subject we are discussing becomes something else—a back-and-forth defensive position with sides. And this parallels exactly what my subconsciousness mind was doing when it was deflecting light from the childhood trauma it was protecting.

Whoa, this is next level wisdom. I have always felt that taking offense was a sort of way to take your ball and go home instead of engage. I have avoided at least acting on a sense of offense (with dismal results, it's usually just sublimated). But your suggestion is closer to a true Buddhist or Law of One approach: to treat it as catalyst. And isn't it always the problem with catalyst that it seems like an obstacle when it is really itself the path forward?

I still think this doesn't deal with the core problem of recognizing something as non-resonant (wrong for you) vs. uncomfortable (and therefore right for you). But it certainly is the case that we ought to be more curious about these things, and give our knee-jerk reactions the skepticism they often deserve. After all, is there anything bad for you that you can't learn from?

Thank you for this, Diana.