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Facing yourself

To this lecture I was inspired before few days, at the Force Academy chat, where its topic was "You are your own worst enemy". So, how are these two things connected?

As many of you, more experienced Jedi students know, self awareness is very important, when you begun your studies of Jedi way. Me personally, I was asked to do introspection of my self at beginning of my training, and now I know why.

Now try to imagine some common situation in your daytime. I think everybody has situations, which annoy you. Or some situation, when you are asked to do something and you just don't want to do it.

If you are aware of your flaws, then you will probably try to avoid these situations, when your flaws want to control your decisions and actions. But, what's important - you must be aware of these flaws, yes, but - it's also very important to WANT fight these flaws. If you are aware of something, it doesn't automatically mean that you want to work on it.

Without question - if you even don't know yourself well, you won't be able to fight with these flaws, because you can't fight something you even don't know. I know it's hard for someone to confess something "bad" about yourself, but believe me, observation of your self is important, without it your "battles" will be lost, I'm sure. In my country we say "Tidy your own house first..", which means "Be honest with yourself first." Knowing yourself well is first step for winning "battles" with yourself.

I know these "fights" can become very difficult, especially when these flaws became too strong. This happens, when these flaws grow stronger inside you, as you surrender to them for many times in the past.

Let's have some examples, how to deal with some flaws you may have:

For example, if you are lazy and now there's another "fight" in your sight, there's time to ask yourself these questions:

1) Is that thing I don't want to do important?
2) Will it help somebody?
3) Will it help me and make me stronger?
4) Will it give me some more experiences which I can learn from?

If there's at least one reply with "yes", you should try to "fight" with your laziness. I know it's easy to say, but it's more difficult to fight with it from my own experiences. But remember, especially laziness can slow down your progress, no matter what are you doing. And, as a Jedi you should be eager with your own improvement.

Or another ilustrative situation, when you are annoyed with something/somebody, stop your actions, take a deep breath and ask yourself these questions:

1) Why I'm annoyed? (It's first thing, which you should yourself ask, when dealing with anger.)
2) Why is this person trying to annoy me?
3) Can this situation be solved in another way, without anger?
4) What I can learn from this situation?

Remember, the most important thing is that you shouldn't act too quickly, and it's better to analyze the situation, you are in. This can be applied to almost every flaw, you face almost every day. Analyzation and knowing why is something happening is very important.

It's not easy fight, I can say it can be a very difficult war, and it's only up to YOU, who will win these little battles or perhaps the whole war. I think, that the quote "You are your own worst enemy" is really true in this case, because if you are strong enough to fight with yourself and your flaws, then there's not bigger enemy for you.

May the Force be with you in these "battles"...