Upgrade

I often hear that life is full of disappointments. Perhaps that true and perhaps it's not life that is full of them but our expectations and attachments to a particular outcome. Key Keyes a self-help author in the 1970's wrote that the key to happiness is to upgrade our addictions to preference - that gives us a little breathing room. An addiction is constricted breathing, a tightness in the chest and anxious feeling - and this occurs even if it's just the thought that our needs may not be met. A preference is a deep, peaceful breath, released with ease and drawn again without anxiety. This is a Buddha breath - in the moment, content. What I like about the upgrade to preference is that it does not diminish our desires - we still have our wants and goals - no, a preference brings us to the point where we can accept all possible outcomes. We may still be disappointed that our preferred outcome wasn't met - but we are no longer crushed if it isn't. We have breathing room.
By the way - Ken Keyes was confined to a wheelchair through much of his adult life. There's no mention of this in any of his books. He would have preferred walking I'm sure - but it wasn't the issue he chose to focus on. He lived his message. For the record - I'm still working on it.