Relax in a safe environment and look at your memories and experiences. This is where your feelings arise. You react to situations according to what you were taught very early in life. You respond to peer influence in order to "belong."

Do you think before you act? Realistically, is that going to help you or someone else? Are you continuing a negative, vengeful mind-set for a past set of events? Is this a fear reaction because of socially stereotyped assumptions? Is how a person looks physically an indication of character and intelligence? Is academic superiority a measure of character? Do you give people a chance to correct a mistake, apologize, and make the appropriate corrections? Are you pleased with yourself after you react emotionally?

We don't get pride vicariously from others, unless we first internalize that understanding as part of our being. Generally, we don't respect and teach emotions in our school systems, yet as human beings, we react to them continuously. We tend to leave emotional control to the family and blame them for negative consequences. But who teaches the parents and caretakers? We expect our religious systems to give spiritual comfort and mandate belief patterns, but we omit emotional guidance.

Pride is formed by making healthy, useful and effective choices as we control of our emotions. Our soul reflects our whole person. Each person, each culture, each community needs to begin looking inside its attitudes about pride. Society needs to fill this emotional gap in understanding so our souls can talk to us in a way that develops our pride of well being. "Well-Being is a healthy attitude toward constructive change in a warm supportive environment. []

Carolyn Ashe Stokes
Republished 9/19/05

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