The school of life
Well-being 🌿 | Improve yourself 🏋️ | #Challenges #Growth #Freedom
TL;DR
Life's challenges are unpredictable, and we face various tests without warning.
Embrace life as an ongoing university, where you have the freedom to choose your lessons and prepare for the tests it throws your way.
You don’t have to be excellent everywhere. Focus on what’s important to you, and leverage synergetic skills.
Seed
I remember I didn’t really like school. But in my adulthood, I've sometimes longed for the simplicity of that time. Back then, life was structured: classes, study sessions, and predictable tests if you prepared well.
Now, life throws tests at us without warning. It throws a lot of them, in so many different shapes and forms: a project going off the rails, illness, challenges at the workplace, losing someone, or even dropping a plate full of delicious Pad Thai... They can feel random and unfamiliar, sometimes on subjects we've never studied. Failing a life test can seem unfair because we weren't given a guidebook.
But these tests often boil down to one essential question: What are you going to do about it? How will you choose to react?
As responsible adults, it's our job to prepare for as many of life's tests as possible. Yes, it's more challenging, but it's entirely achievable.
Consider this: life presents tests that are indeed very challenging. But we also pass tests we might not even recognise as such because we've become so skilled that they feel effortless, sometimes even enjoyable.
Another point to consider is that you might be able to tackle many different tests or at least make them easier to handle by developing just one skill. Resilience, for instance, applies to various scenarios.
So, view life as your ongoing university. You have the freedom to choose your teachers – countless mentors are out there, willing to help you grow. And you have the flexibility to select which 'classes' you'll attend and for how long.
But with freedom comes responsibility. It is your responsibility to seek out new classes and organise this learning path so that you can be prepared when the tests arrive.
Example
I have a dog - as you may know by now. The day she passes away, I'll obviously be devastated. And the worst thing that could happen to me is not being prepared for that.
I have the benefit of knowing it is going to happen. But I don’t know when. Therefore, every day I'm around her, I make sure to spend at least a few seconds to pet her and think about the fact that this could be the last time, and that I am grateful to have had her in my life until now.
It’s not a sad thought; on the contrary, it fills me with joy because I am truly grateful. I know that if she were to disappear from my life the next day, I will have done everything I could for myself to be at peace with this.
That doesn’t mean I won’t feel a thing, but I will feel more ready, and I will have no regrets.
Bonus
I have the perfect YouTube channel to share in this post: The School of Life
They cover a wide range of topics, and have nice animations.