My birthday is right around the corner. Birthdays, like the New Year, are cause for reflection. I have decided to share a few life lessons I have learned over the years.
1. There are no short cuts to success.
Be it in the gym, classroom, or life – success comes from the good habits you perform daily. Everyone wants the promised land. No one wants the desert experience. Trust and believe there will be a desert experience. If success were that easy, EVERYONE would have it. I heard a message preached that success comes from doing what you know is right/needed regardless of how you feel no matter how long it takes.
#word
2. To quote Shakespeare, 'All the world's a stage.'
Someone once told me that you have to be friends with someone before you decide to date them because that is the only way to know the real person. Once you put a label on something, people start frontin'. By frontin' I mean playing the role, being insincere.
The balancing act comes from being aware of this truth without becoming jaded. I try, emphasis on try, to meet people where they are in life with as little judgement as possible. I believe that way they feel more comfortable being who they truly are. I have also come to accept that people are who they are and will be who they choose to be.
Players gonna play. Ballers gonna ball.
To quote MC Breed, "Ain't No Future in Your Frontin' ".
3. OTN: When someone shows you who they really are, BELIEVE THEM!
OMG this is a lesson on which I seem to keep failing the test. I just want/need to believe the best about people. I do not want to be someone who navigates relationships with lowered expectations, always suspicious of ulterior motives. I am taking copious notes in preparation for the next test.
4. "Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help." Psalms 146:3.
I understand this verse to denote recognizing the humanity, fallibility of man. Accepting others mistakes makes it easier to acknowledge, accept and forgive our own.
5. Love is an exercise in vulnerability.
You cannot get to it being fenced in by insecurities, anger, resentment, or relationship baggage. March around Gideon getting your praise on and let those walls fall. (You would have had to present during a bible study or two to catch the reference.)
If you think about it, God is love. You are really opening up the God part of you to the God part of someone else. If God is in it, there is no limit. *Cue Israel Houghton*
What are some life lessons that you have garnered over the years?