When most of us take a glimpse of our past, we often identify portions of our history that we would wish to have deleted. Portions that we feel were never useful or never added value to us and portions that we do not feel proud of. Portions in which we feel we experienced nothing short of wastage. Portions that we often skip or make us cover our faces whenever we narrate our life story to others. If there were a perfect drug to induce forgetfulness, these are phases that could motivate us into becoming users of such a drug.
These portions could include people we believe only came to mess up our life story. It could be an employer who only served to belittle and smoke dignity out of you or even a place that left you with bad memories. For others, it is a relationship that went sour; a marriage that became abusive; a loved one that was lost or a business empire that came crashing down. It could be when one got abused, sexually or otherwise; when one got into addiction of alcohol and substance abuse or any other regrettable moment.
It is likely that you are reading this article while going through a phase of your life that you would wish you skipped. A phase you are sure you will never be proud of. It could be that your business is sinking; that your marriage is threatening to hit rock bottom; that your financials are in a bad shape; that you just lost a loved one; that you are having a string of bad debts and the list is endless.
Dear reader, today I bring you news of hope and which seek to trigger you to change your perception on these not-so-attractive parts of your life story. Life is a journey, a continuous one at that. One that has no stop overs for anyone still breathing. A journey that is full of timeless lessons at any given point. Every event, every person, every place, every circumstance that we encounter in life presents us with loads of learning opportunities. There is always a link to your destiny in every scenario that happens to you. There is always something positive in everything that happens to you. Learning, however, is not automatic. It only happens to those who are open to learning and who are open to positivity.
Let us undertake a small memory exercise. Figure out your current position in any sphere of your life, say employment. Attempt to play your life tape backwards by asking yourself, ‘how did I get here?’ and be as sincere to yourself as you can possibly get. Then you begin to realize that everywhere you have been, played a role. You probably met someone in a place who told you of a vacancy somewhere and one thing led to the other. You begin to realize that the frustrations of your former employer provoked you to aggressively look for another job which led you to your current status. In such a case, your former employer ceases to be irrelevant. That employer just served the role he/she was meant to serve in your life journey.
If you were to perform this playback exercise in all areas of your life from marriage, to spirituality, to business, to employment, to academics and others; the findings would be more interesting. You begin to realize that the person you wish to delete from your story had a positive role to play in making you who you are today. That frustration that you went through had lots of lessons for your progress. That collapsed business that you hate talking about has lessons that could sustain your next business to levels never witnessed before. When I talked to one of the most enthusiastic HIV/AIDS activists, who is also a victim of the same, she told me in a strong way that one of the reasons she has pushed on for long is the realization that she had to be a victim in order to effectively save the world from the plight of what she best understands. What an attitude! Her story transforms those not infected and gives hope to those already infected. In her, the infected see someone who perfectly understands them.
For those going through these phases today, do not feel dejected. Do not give up yet. Life is giving you chance to learn big lessons for the next level. Open your eyes wide enough and spot the lesson. Do not concentrate on the negative aspects of what you are going through. Always remember that there is something positive inside that experience. Dig it out. That is how to afford a brave face when the world around you expects you to be crashing. Refuse to crash in pain, rather grown in pain.
The chain of life is never broken. There is no vacuum in life. Everyone you meet, pleasant or not, did not come your way accidentally. Before you rubbish them off, be sure to dig out the positive link they are carrying for you. It could be a direct link to greatness or a lesson that will prove useful in your next level. We have people whose relationships today are blossoming courtesy of the lessons they learnt from their previous failed relationships. There is no accident in life. Make a choice to look in the positive direction. Do not be a fault finder, because fault finders find fault even in paradise! Be open to learning from everything that life throws your way. The prime question is, ‘what are you doing with your current situation?’ Are you whining about it or winning with it? No portion in your life qualifies for deletion. Pick something from everything, from everywhere and from everyone because YOU CAN DO BETTER!
Roy Okonji
Trainer | Motivational Speaker | Team Builder | Life Coach | Mentor
I have come to view life with a much more positive attitude since i started reading focus talk.
Martin, thank you. Humbled. That attitude is all you need. The rest shall follow