Medium: Earth Can Be Hell. It Can Also Be Heaven.

The difference is not always what happens to us. Sometimes it is what we learn to notice—and what we decide to change.

This image was created by ChatGPT. The following post was created with ChatGPT as it reads all of what I have written and comes up with copy that matches and stays consistent throughout all my Medium and Substack writings.

Earth can be hell.

It can also be heaven.

And, if you have ever tried to assemble furniture with someone you love, it can be both in the same afternoon.

I have been thinking about how two people can look at the same life and see entirely different things. One sees a prison. The other sees a place to begin. One sees a bad day. The other sees a story that has not finished yet.

Neither person is necessarily foolish. Life is not a personality test with an answer key. But the way we interpret what happens can make a difference to what we do next.

That is where the mind comes in.

The place between our ears

We carry a running commentary everywhere. It arrives with us at breakfast. It sits beside us at work. It has opinions at three in the morning, when nobody asked it for a meeting.

Something goes wrong, and the commentary starts: This always happens to me. I cannot do this. Things will never change.