Look at all the things going around in our world - floods, sickness, earthquakes, depression, recession, loss of jobs, losing a home or a loved one, fights, battles, wars, hijacks, politics, corruption; the list is endless
Unfortunately, no one hands out any instruction book on how to deal with life.
In our growing years we were expecting life to be one big party. And once we got our act together as an adult, what a surprise! A few years after reaching adulthood and having to deal with the real world, one comes to the realization that life is difficult. Life is not a spectacle or a feast; it is a predicament.
Regardless of age, if we foolishly expect living to become easier down the road, forget it. Irrespective of how talented or how rich or how old one maybe if truth be told, everyone experiences stress and pain to a certain degree. Mistakes and setbacks add up to success. Then success leads to failure. This is life. Life doesn’t allow us to remain still. We have to keep moving and adapting and changing and in the process have to learn to love life.
Life teaches us to cope. If we consider our-self fortunate or less fortunate as the case may be it also helps us to realize nothing is as grim as it first appears. Today's crisis makes tomorrow's interesting story. What we call experience.
Life can be relatively difficult or relatively easy. What matters is how we react to our environment. Whenever life gets overwhelming, I subject myself to this mind-altering question: "Yea, life is tough - but then again, compared to what?” Seriously we don’t even have to go that far…even if we look around our neighborhood… we will realize we are so blessed- our life is way better.
So the lesson for myself is that life can be tough, sometimes it is harder than one thought it could be. Sure sometimes life broke my heart and made me cry for days. This is the real life. In real life we DO get to make our choices and we CAN become the person we dream of being. Even if not everyone we love will get to see the final result of all our hard work. It's a big lesson, and a hard one to learn, but it's well worth it.
All told, life is a learning process and the school of hard knocks is a great teacher. Pleasure and comfort don't build character - adversity does! Would I change my life and wish it to be otherwise? I am blessed:)
16 comments:
Excellent post Mee! And so true - one has to take the roughs with the smooth!
Ajoy Vakil
If only we could take things as they come instead of cribbing always!
Like you say Mee, everyone goes through stress points in life- some are serious high pressure points, I always say to myself -this too shall pass' and for sure it does.
Hey, that was lovely...we can choose our response ....and Life is as tough as we think it is .
Life is a process of unfulfilled dreams and desires. We get one and aim 10 more. Secondly, we perceive it more harder because our wish-list never translates into reality on time i.e. you wanted a new car at the age of 20, and got it when 30, a beautiful spacious apartment at 30, got it in late 40s, and so on. Only Aladin's Lamp can make one's life easier.
Moreover, true life is about giving away, serving the humanity, helping, sharing the sad moments, crying, soothing,....., but
Life will remain tough.
hi meenakshi,
in life it is mandatory that 'pain & sorrow' will come, will happen...but it is not compulsory for one to get overawed by it (jeevan mein dukh hona anivarya hai, dukhi hona nahi)
if we try and follow the dictum, "unreal never lived, real never dies", then every pain is relatively easily managable
Cheers to a good post!
anil
I am reminded of Osho after reading your lovely post. He says- Life is without purpose-life is its own purpose, therefore he who lives without purpose truly lives. Live! Is not living itself enough?
To me life is all about Life-a gift or punishment, depepnding on the lens you see it thru:)
Once we go thru school, then college philosophy, and the day-to-day rat race of work takes over with pressures of family and mortgage etc we often lose our bearings. We allow ourselves to be robbed of any real chance for meaning, purpose and a focus-our existence and future are devalued from being children of God to being just one of many species of animals on this earth. If you look at the last 150 years of history, it’s sad that mankind has felt the need to live according to alleged intelligence and reason rather than according to the laws and love of the Supreme being. Its time to re-organize and seek existence again.
Reminds me of the person who told me during the highly stressful MBBS entrance preparation times, "ek baar MBBS mein admission le lo, phir aish hi aish hai"... I'm done and dusted with MS now, and haven't seen "aish" as yet. :))
Its an Ongoing process as you rightly put it.. You have no full stops.
If we can learn to exist harmoniusly, avoid divisiveness, spread love n forgiving n forbearance and stop I me myself all the time Life becomes worth every second of our existence
Life is beautiful. The trick is to stay positive, surround oneself with good energies, and on the not so good days tap into this reserve of energies. There is a lot to learn, a lot to give, a lot to share and time runs out fast:)
mee,,, i loved this blogpost on life it is simply brilliant
seema
I loved your blog...having gone through a crisis recently...I could relate to it 100%.
Mahua
Sometimes I love life and go thru everyday with a smile. Sometimes I abhor life and the sad existence. Sometimes I think one is living in a hellhole punishment mode and sometimes I feel blessed with opportunities and the comfort I have. Life is rough and smooth in parts- can never be one cycle forever. Its pace n changes remain unpredictable and the wheel of movement keeps teaching us lessons.
Well said.
In the Mahabharata, Krishna had said to Yudhishtir that there's always somebody less fortunate than you- so be happy with what you've got.
By the way, you forgot to add "volcanoes" in your first sentence! hah
@Ajoy - ty:)
@Raj - like I said in one of my tweets today we need to say less of " I wish I had..." to " lets do this...":)
@Mel - Absolutely true!:)
@Muse - U said it:)!
@Aijaz- only if everybody was as wise. I don't 'giving' comes naturally to us...
@Pharma Pharmer - indeed right! Here's to equanimity:)
@Jim- as always tremendous meaning in Oshoisms:)
@Geeta- if we seek Existence again, we will indeed have harmony amongst us
@dr. sohrab arora - nope, no full stops- its a continuous process, we need to keep refining ourselves:)
@RS -:):)
@Sheila - we live only once and we better live right:)
@Seema- ty:)
@Mahua- I hope all good with the family?:)
@Ashish - that is life, no? And we gotta keep moving, stay centred
@Neeraj - am sure I forgot many more things like 'volcanoes':) Mahabharata has sooo many things to learn from on a daily basis.
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