Mouths of Babes

A program friend and I were out walking the dogs recently, and passed a family in which a small girl was hopping up a set of stairs, repeatedly reciting the following in that sing-song way kids have:

"You get what you get, and you don't get upset!"

My friend and I turned to each other and laughed, saying it could be a new Al-Anon slogan.

So much of my past misery has been because I couldn't accept what I "got", and I was furiously upset about it. I raged and stormed about my life, and I fought and struggled and kicked against my fate. (I rarely use that word, because it always sounds like it should be accompanied by dramatic music.)

When I was new to program, and people would speak of acceptance, I thought they were either barking mad, or didn't have as an unhappy a home life as I did. Because if they did, they wouldn't be telling me to accept it - on the contrary, they'd be falling all over themselves telling me what a martyr I was, and asking how I managed so well.

Right.

I got what I got, and then spent the next nine years seething with futile resentment. I can see how far I've come in program, by the looks I received the other day when asked to agree that people who believed in ____ were boneheads, by a fellow member of a club to which I belong. I replied that I try to live my life, and let other people live theirs. I don't feel the need to make other people adopt my way of living, and I don't tell people what they should and shouldn't be doing. If it doesn't negatively impact me, then it's none of my business.

You get what you get, and you don't get upset.

I like that, it's a good mantra. Maybe I should write and see if I can get it accepted as CAL.