Today I feel very good about myself* for this reason – not because I have accomplished what I hoped or made the comprehensive changes I intended, but because I have kept coming back to what is really important to me. And I have made progress, albeit slow. Today I understand that it is not my personal failing, but rather the Core Paradox that explains the condition of being able to see what "should" be, but falling short of achieving it. Yes, we mourn – but we do not allow our sadness to paralyze us, because it could be no other way.
It is only truly sad if we allow the disparity between what we hoped for and what is to defeat us.
Instead I'd call it a victory to have this insight, and to no longer hope to achieve a state of maximized potential – rather to celebrate the day by day integration of past pain and disappointment that leads to more wisdom, acceptance and happiness.
"Core Paradox" is another term for what Saniel Bonder coined the Core Wound. For more on this, see all the writings of Saniel Bonder or the excellent book Becoming Divinely Human by C.C. Leigh http://amzn.to/1Pep1C2
*feeling bad about oneself is socially acceptable, while feeling good about oneself invites judgments like "conceited" or "arrogant". So it feels like a stretch into vulnerability to allow myself this feeling. I am brought back to Jesus' admonition "you shall love your neighbor as yourself" – not love your neighbor instead of yourself or better than yourself. Feeling good about oneself contains feelings of love, acceptance and appreciation. It seems to me to be problematic and difficult, if not impossible, to truly feel good about other people if we don't feel good about ourselves.
