I love music. My favorite aspect is the lyrics; I love listening to and dissecting them. I find Big Sean’s music particularly fascinating, and I truly think he is a lyrical genius. Many of his lyrics resonate with what I value in life, especially in his song ‘No hearts, No love’, when he raps:

 Lyrics : You love me, I love you, you hate me, I love you.

To me, these lyrics mean to love all people, regardless of how they feel about us. Don’t let anybody dictate or control your happiness. In so many of our moments, we find ourselves reacting, filled with anger, not at peace with ourselves and our happiness, simply because of other people. Whether it’s what somebody said or did, at the end of the day we allow ourselves to be affected by people, which ultimately affects our happiness levels. How you ask? Let me explain.

Anytime I hear these lyrics I think back to Dr. Wayne Dyer’s example of an orange being squeezed. If you haven’t heard of this before, below is an excerpt from one of his seminars explaining what it is!

 “If I were to squeeze this orange as hard as I could, what would come out?” I asked him.

He looked at me like I was a little crazy and said, “Juice, of course.”

“Do you think apple juice could come out of it?”

“No!” he laughed.

“What about grapefruit juice?”

“No!”

“What would come out of it?”

“Orange juice, of course.”

“Why? Why when you squeeze an orange does orange juice come out?”

He may have been getting a little exasperated with me at this point.

“Well, it’s an orange and that’s what’s inside.”

I nodded. “Let’s assume that this orange isn’t an orange, but it’s you. And someone squeezes you, puts pressure on you, says something you don’t like, offends you. And out of you comes anger, hatred, bitterness, fear. Why? The answer, as our young friend has told us, is because that’s what’s inside.”

If you are constantly filled with anger, judgement and frustration, then when people pressure you with their own frustration—and trust me, many people will—then that hatred, judgment and frustration is the very thing that is going to be projected into the universe and upon yourself. It is impossible to live a life filled with happiness, peace, and joy when you feel the exact opposite within yourself.

They are going to be so many people who spew hatred into this universe, and that’s okay. We should not allow these people to dictate our own happiness, because we simply can’t control them. You can’t control negative people. You can’t stop someone taking their frustrations out on you. You can’t control how hurt people, hurt people. The only thing you can control is your reaction. So don’t allow people or situations to control you; both are powerless without your reaction. Don’t give people the power to change you. Don’t let something you can’t control, control you. Throughout your life, constantly remind yourself that if I cannot control this - whatever “this” is whether it is a person or situation I won’t let it control me.

You have to understand that the more you allow yourself to hold onto anger, judgement, negativity and frustration within yourself, the more you are causing yourself to suffer. Think back to Dr. Wayne Dyer’s example of squeezing the orange. Whatever is inside you will come out if you’re under enough pressure. You must understand that it is never about who the person is or what they have done; it is about who you are, who you want to be, and how you want to live your life. Why are you allowing someone else to force you to live in a realm of frustration, anger, and hatred? When all you have to do is love them, even when they are producing hate towards you, and you will free yourself from the chains of suffering.

The only way to be truly happy in your life is by having no hatred within yourself. This is obviously easier said than done, but through my experience this is what I found to be most helpful solution when creating happiness for yourself. You will never be happy if you hold with anger, judgment, bitterness and hatred within yourself. Think back to Big Sean’s lyrics when you’re having a difficult time and truly understand that you need to have love inside of you at all times, no matter who the person is, what they have done or what they are currently doing. Have the mental toughness within you to not change who you are as a human so you can build better habits daily.

Many of us allow people to change who we are as a person because we’re in the habit of reacting. To put it simply, a habit happens when your body automatically responds and doesn’t need the involvement of your mind. In other words, habit is when you do something so many times that your body comes to know how to do it better than your mind. In order to break any habit related to how you act, think, react, or interpret things, you must harness discipline to react better. Any time you have an opportunity to react as your old self with mindfulness, remember that you have an opportunity to react as your new self so that you can build better habits. As you continue to live with awareness and discipline, over time you will create the habit of responding based on the person who you truly want to be in life.

Truly unravel Big Sean’s lyrics and when you do, harness the discipline to love people even when they are giving you every opportunity to do the exact opposite. Why allow a person other than yourself to control your happiness and wellbeing? What these lyrics mean to me is that no matter who the person is, what they have done or how they treat me, I am not going to change who I am or who I want to be as a person. It does not matter if you love or hate me, I am going to treat you the same because I only have love inside of me for all things, and that love is not dependent on how you treat me. These lyrics are by far my favorite lyrics in any song because the message behind them is so simple and needed in life. Way too many times we find ourselves reacting to people based on how they are treating us, but if we just live by Big Sean’s lyrics we would live with so much more happiness in our lives.

Always remember to love everybody especially the people who produce the most hate, because they truly need it the most.