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How to Find Serenity in an Unfair World: The Path of Acceptance and Action
Part 3 of 5: Overcoming Unrealistic Expectations
Fairness is one of my most important values. I really want things to be fair for people. At the same time, I get that the world is not fair.
What I’ve come to learn is that just because fairness is a value of mine, that doesn’t mean I have to be pissed off when things aren’t fair. Just because I don’t agree with something doesn’t mean I have to be pissed off about it. I didn’t know that until I got into recovery. To me,
Disagreement = pissed off
What that means is that I was allowing all kinds of situations that bothered me to steal my serenity. It’s like I was fighting against reality, as if this should be fair. And that may be so in an ideal world, things should be fair for everyone. But who gets to decide what’s “fair?” My definition of fairness is not the same as yours.
I’ve come to understand that a lot of difficulty in my life gets removed once I accept things the way they are. I don’t always have a conscious idea in my head about the way they should be. I’ve learned that resentment is a good indicator of when I’m not accepting something. That’s often an indicator that I have some kind of an expectation that things should be…
