I was asked to have a quick bite to eat with a friend tonight and have a chat. He is going through a few things at home. It is always interesting conversations, however when we were walking to the car I was saying how short life really is, even if we get the eighty years. He agreed and mentioned how crazy it is how we wish away time, looking forward to when Autumn passes, or we can't wait until the Spring arrives. It is crazy, isn't it?
Every time has opportunity.
They have been going through a divorce and recently, they told their near-adult child that they are going to split, which can be a hard time on a kid. However, what he has been surprised by is how much the child has grown up in those few weeks, and how he seems more mature, even though at a physical level, nothing has changed.
Space.
I think it is important to recognize that maturity comes through experience and if we do not face a particular condition, we are unlikely to grow the understanding and skills in that area. As a parent, we want to protect our children from a lot of the negative, but we don't always consider the cost of doing so, the missed opportunity to strengthen, to pull together.
For instance, the night they told their kid, instead of sitting around the house they went for a drive with their best friend instead - just talking. The friend has been through something similar some time ago, but what is more important than that is building that relationship. Again, it is something that we don't necessarily consider, but best friends aren't made in the good times, they are made in the bad. They are built through shared experiences of supporting each other. It is through those moments we learn the most about each other, and have the chance to carry that together, protect it for each other.
There is risk in all relationships.
We were discussing the space to grow and I used the example of when we moved into this house from an apartment, and how my daughter grew in the weeks and months, as she had more space to be herself, more room to roam out of sight. And, how since she started walking to and from school by herself a few weeks ago, she has grown again, taking more responsibility for herself, looking to make more of her own decisions.
I often mention that if we were each to write an autobiography, our early years would likely talk about the challenges we overcame to be who we are today. But what those challenges really are, are opportunities, space in time where we we get a chance to experience difficulty, have it impact on us, hurt us, and then force us to grow in ways we wouldn't otherwise have grown.
We often talk about how flowers grow toward the sun, but that only tells half of the story, because the other part of the story is that they grow away from the darkness. We need the negative experiences in our lives so we have something at our backs, something driving us to evolve into a better us, a better future, a better outcome. If we spend all of our time wishing we were somewhere brighter, we will likely miss the greatest lessons our experience has to offer.
While it saddens me that it is the case, I read a lot of stories of young people who are unable to overcome, who are given space and time to grow, but can't evolve fast enough, or in the right way, taking their young lives before they have really experienced what is truly beautiful. Hardship and difficulties isn't something to escape, it is something to learn from and perhaps it is only when we have faced them and learned, do we ever really appreciate the sun on our face.
Depression runs rampant in society now and there are many reasons for it, but I believe that the main one is that we are disconnected from each other, because we silo ourselves off from one another. We surround ourselves with material that supports our belief system, including our beliefs about ourselves - even if they are false. And then we surround ourselves with people similar, who perpetuate our world view, rather than with people who we can trust will both be our shoulder, and be the voice that calls us out on our bullshit when we need it.
A world of yes men.
Rather than a world of spatial experiences that test us and help us evolve, we seek out safe spaces where we are protected, where we can't get hurt. It isn't just in schools and society, it is also when we are alone. Rather than the space in our head to reflect, we fill it with the content we desire, the topics that we enjoy, even if they are bad for us, even if they support those lying beliefs we insist are true.
Every moment has opportunity and potential attached to it, but we keep wishing we are secure, wishing we were somewhere else, wishing we were someone else, in a world where there is only uncertainty and we can only be precisely where we are, as who we are in that very moment.
There is no time to change. But there is space.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
