We often forget this simple fact that learning is a lifelong process. As soon as we open our eyes to this world, we begin to learn how to get our basic needs fulfilled. Then as we age, we make attachments and learn how to associate feelings with people.
One vital part of our human learning process is making mistakes. It’s only after falling down or failing that we realise how to pick up the pieces and put them back together. But often when we encounter trouble, we lose our optimism and faith before succumbing to circumstance.
But simply submitting to these situations is not the solution. Instead, we should choose to grow, learning what went wrong and becoming wiser for the future. If you give into unwanted situations and don’t look for the lesson it is trying to teach you, you’ll be trapped in a cycle of pestering situations.
Beware the Lure Social Acceptance
As human beings, we are social creatures and naturally seek social approval. Sometimes we can go to an extreme extent to get that approval, without realising the degree of pain we put others through. And once we receive the approval we crave, the pressure doubles as we struggle to maintain this position in the hierarchy.
At this point, we often forget the truth of our existence. We would be nothing without the people who helped us climb the ladder of life. But hurting people during this process can become a habit and with no remorse, or even a compulsion. But this doesn’t lead to true happiness, loneliness will always linger. This is something I did not realise until last summer.
Learning From My Failures
I had always been a very carefree and casual human. As a child, I was highly pampered and babied by my parents, specifically my mother. We were four siblings, two sisters and two brothers. All four of us were very different. My siblings had something against me from the very beginning, for obvious reasons. I didn’t care much at the time since I’d already gained a whole bunch of new friends.
As I grew up, I was filled with self-esteem, confidence and high self-worth. A people’s person, as they called me, I was always in the centre of the spotlight at every gathering, meeting and party. I cultivated an interest in music and along with four of my friends, formed a rock band that proved to be extremely successful and (almost) famous. I fell in love with popularity and recognition. Out of jealousy, my “old-time” friends were no longer around.
But right at the peak of my happiness, I started losing people. My siblings had long abandoned me, which I never really cared about. Then due to some unforeseen circumstances, our rock band and our raging popularity seemed to shatter.
Now I can see clearly it was not a circumstance that broke our band, it was my brash attitude towards life and people. It was not jealousy that repelled my ‘old-time’ friends; it was my crude behaviour towards them. I became so self-absorbed that I never cared how others felt because of my conduct. If I had bothered to stop my brothers and sisters from leaving, I may have learned the lesson of life and avoided this destructive process.
Discover the Root Cause and Break the Chain
People tend to overlook the subtle signs life gives us as lessons, this prevents us from breaking these vicious circles of unwanted situations. We often attribute our flaws to misfortune or bad luck and fail to recognise the real faults that lie without ourselves.
A rough conduct is the biggest culprit. It made me so blind to my own faults that I continued committing mistakes without taking responsibility for my actions. And not just that, if we fail to recognise the lessons life wants to teach us, these undesirable situations simply repeat themselves.
The communication gap is another huge factor that contributes to this issue. We must always remember that communication is a two-way process. It happens between two people and compliance from both the sides is required. Communication distortion can lead to serious errors in expression, a disaster for our relationships. Most of these conflicts can be traced back to our relationships. People can become haughty and arrogant because of miscommunication, miss the cues and cause serious clashes. It’s arrogance that then prevents them from correcting their mistakes, so it seems they never learn.
Grasp the Lessons Life is Trying To Teach You
Every one of us creates our own set of moral values and principles. They become the ethics and code of conduct we follow throughout life. While we are born with some values, others are pushed in by our parents and the society. These values determine our thought process, perception and attitude towards everything we come across. But it’s essential to keep an open mind, so new experiences can lead to new skills and proficiencies.
Committing a mistake is not the end of the world, in fact, it’s entirely natural. But succumbing to the situation only stalls your learning curve. Stat open minded and accept mistakes as the lessons they are. If you can comprehend what exactly went wrong, it’s a valuable life experience. To prevent these unwanted situations from repeating themselves, you need to face the consequences. You’ll learn a lot about yourself in the process!
