“Always let your conscience be your guide.”-Jiminy Cricket
I don’t always follow the advice I give to my family or friends. I’ve been told on numerous occasions that I’m a good listener and I give good advice.
So why can’t I take my own?
In almost every situation I’ve been through that didn’t end on a positive note, I ask or tell myself, “how did I allow this to happen?” or “Damn, I let this shit happen AGAIN!!!” I always think back to some of the advice that I’ve given out. And sometimes I cringe at the fact that I could’ve avoided another “traumatic” experience, if I had just listened to myself.
But I feel like we as humans do that far too often. We see someone we love and care about going through one of the worst times of their life and we want to either fix it or guide them so they can resolve their issue. We know exactly what they need to do in order to rectify their situation because deep down, you don’t want them to feel the pain or trauma that you’ve felt numerous times before. And yet, we still manage to go through the same cycle.
I was catching up with one of my former coworkers recently and we got on this subject and I said, “my advice is on point and I ignore it every time” which in turn, he made a good point by commenting that we as humans always want to try one more thing or way of fixing our tough situation just to see if this particular way will work (knowing deep down it won’t). He continued on to say that we know better and we know what we’re doing isn’t the advice we would give someone else.
And he was totally right. It’s exactly what I said earlier, we don’t want to contribute to “screwing up” someone else’s life with the advice that we give, because we do love and care about the people around us. However, when it comes to our own lives, we’ll jump right back into the vicious cycle that we’ve been in before.
It’s like we have to try and fail over and over again, in order to truly understand, “oh wait I really shouldn’t do it like this again.”
That’s a part of life. We have to try and fail so many times to get it right. Even if the situation is similar to the one before. I have to admit I still get frustrated with myself when I realize I allowed the same situation to happen to me again. I’ll look at myself in the mirror and just say “Really? Really Tai? Again?”
But each time, I always take something from it.
Is it irritating? Absolutely.
Will you fail again? Yes, you will.
Will you learn from it? You bet.
Will you be smarter? Smarter than Einstein…maybe not him but you will be smarter
And then you’ll finally get to a point where you’ll be better at handling these situations. No one ever said life was easy. No one ever said that you’ll only go through one tough situation in your life. No one ever said that you won’t fall and get up again.
How are you going to get up the next time?
Life Lessons from a Novice 