It’s been a while since I’ve posted on here; almost 2-and-a-half years to be exact! Since then, I’ve grown so much as a person. Since then, I’ve learned a lot about who I am, about other people, and about life, in general. These are a few of those things.
Don’t let other people distract you from what your goal and purpose in life is. Nothing else matters except passing that class, getting that job, getting your degree, etc.
Petty things don’t bother me as much as they used to.
Let the other person be right for the sake of your own sanity.
Broaden your horizons; your path will change and that is OK. If you open yourself up to possibilities other than what you’ve always told yourself you wanted/expected/needed, you might realize that you’ve been wrong about what you used to think.
Confrontation is not always negative and does not have to be negative. You have to communicate maturely with people to fix issues. That’s how life works.
It pays to be nice. Be nice for the sake of being nice.
Do it for the love. For the love of mastery; for the love of self-discipline. If you don’t care about getting the credit, you do it for the love of craft. When you do this, you’ll feel fulfillment just creating and expressing yourself.
Friendships will fade. Someone whom you once knew as a close friend will eventually be someone who, upon hearing their name, only brings back memories from long ago—and that’s OK.
On the contrary, friendships will blossom. People that you’ve known as “that one guy or girl who is in all of my classes” will become someone that you go to bed looking forward to seeing the next day.
It’s OK to cry. Cry a little or cry a lot—it’s therapeutic and actually helps.
Allow yourself to be a novice. It’s OK to suck. Create your worst work ever. Allow yourself to hear others tell you it’s the worst thing they’ve ever seen. Once you do this, there’s nowhere to go but up.
Sometimes you need to allow yourself a day to stay in, in pajamas, away from others (even your friends).
People only act the best they can with the knowledge they have at the time. The actions of others say more about them than you.
In the end, realize that nothing is permanent. Most toxic situations will end. Count down the days. Tell yourself it’ll be over soon because it will. The only constant in life is change.
When all else fails, kill ‘em with kindness. Be the better person. Acknowledge someone else’s existence even if you don’t feel like it. Just because someone does something that grinds your gears (whether on purpose or not) doesn’t mean that you have to reciprocate. Give people nothing to complain about except how great of a person you are.
Forgiving is one of the best things you can learn to do. It doesn’t make you weak, and it doesn’t mean you condone the actions of the person you are forgiving. It makes you free.
The list could go on and on. For now, these are the things that stick out in my mind. What are some things that you have learned in your life?
-JA
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