That was then & this is now. Powerful, sometimes meaningless words. They've been used to describe every type of situation we can get ourselves into that over time has changed in some fundamental way. It really doesn't matter if the change was really all that earth shattering, only that it felt that way to us. They tell us that hindsight is 20/20. I don't think so.
I've found a blog site & contest, that has pictures of people repeating poses in pictures taken long ago. It's a fun site, check it out. Even though some of these people try very hard, the pictures are never the same. Even if they could fit into the exact same clothes & find the right props & places, it wouldn't be the same. That moment captured in the original picture is gone, for some, long gone. Some of the props are lost, some of the places are now history themselves. But, it is fun to pay homage to the past once in a while.
Back to the hindsight thing. I used to tell myself if I could go & I would do this & that different. Finally, I realized that there was very little I could change in my life that would seriously alter the outcome. Maybe I wouldn't have become + when I did, but I might have at a later date. Wishes & ought-to-be's can be really self-defeating & hurtful. Like it or not this is the proverbial world we live in & time for that matter. We just have to deal with all those cliche cards that have been dealt to us.
I've figured out five things I'd write to my past self if I could send my younger self a letter. The first one would be to learn to let go. I am a Virgo & I really hate change & I'm not to big a fan of surprises either. There are so many times when I should've let go of the proverbial rope & trusted that I would land safely somewhere better. This was the time in my life when I should've said, " I am a leaf on the wind, watch me soar." Instead I clung to hells I knew fearing the ones I didn't.
Next, I would've told myself to have some faith. Faith in myself mostly. Faith in my judgment & my abilities. I let too many others tell me I couldn't do things or that things would be too hard on me. I later learned that I could do those things even if they weren't the easiest things in the world to do. I could've stayed in math when I was younger. I could've got a slightly harder job to get me through. There are simply too many I could haves to count.
Try a little harder would've been my next bit of advice, I skated through life & school. I never really tried at anything. I'd never seen anyone in my life try to do anything except con people & take griping to an art form. I could've pushed & been a much better student, artist & yes a person. I'm not trying put myself down, but I really have no idea what I could've done with my life, because I never really tried.
No is not such a bad word, would be my next nugget of self-directed wisdom. I used to hate to hear the word "No". I took it as a rejection, a judgement, a criticism... All these negative things were invariably pointed my direction. I hated to say no to people almost as much as I hated hearing it myself. This got me in a lot of sticky situations. I finally realized something about the word no, it was powerful & empowering. It was liberating & sometimes quite kind. There are times we should be told no & others when that no is actually a not now, but maybe later.
I have come to believe in the idea of bad luck being good & good luck being bad. My talent for learning was actually not as much a blessing as I had thought it was when I was younger. Because of it I never pushed myself. Maybe if learning had been more difficult for me I would've valued it & my accomplishments a bit more. Some people should not win the lottery, all that $ may seem like a blessing, but for many it will actually turn out to be far more of a burden. Luck or fortune are pretty ambivalent. You may think you've just hit the jackpot, but you have no idea what's around the bin. Fortune is largely in one's perspective & willingness to thankful.
The last thing I would tell myself is to hold on to myself & my dreams, but not to be afraid to let them change & grow as I did. So many of us get stuck in these ideas we create for ourselves when were young, that we can't see that those are no longer our dreams. That those goals were unrealistic or potentially even harmful. Our dreams are alive & must grow with us or else they'll just hold us back in a time that no longer exists. We can't be like the Carl from UP, our dreams must evolve.
That is the advice I would give my younger self if I could. What would you tell your younger self?
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