“Lord, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.“

    I say this little prayer every time I feel down, upset or frustrated. Though not a charm to lift my spirits up instantaneously, it does keep me from hitting rock bottom.

    There’s a fine line between what we can change and what we can’t; and a finer line between what we can change and what isn’t worth changing. Knowing where to draw these two lines is, what I think, the key to staying sane. Most of the time we put in so much effort (physically and emotionally) in trying to change the things that aren’t just worth it and in the process, tend to neglect ones that actually need amending; and at the end of the day, we regret both - what we have done and what we have NOT done.

    I think life would be much simpler if only there was a guidebook (technically, an instruction manual), complete with an index, listing down every can-be-changed, cannot-be-changed, need-to-be-changed, need-not-be-changed, should-be-changed and should-not-be-changed aspect of life. Place your situation in one of the six categories and you’ll know what has to be done. hmmm…sadly, life is never meant to be that simple and hence, one such book never gets published. So, at those times when you don’t know whether to ‘do something about it’ or ‘just shut up, put up and move on’; and the very thought of deciding between the two intimidates you, it helps to say, “Lord, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.”

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