5 Life Lessons for the New Year

Life is never easy- not for anyone. If you agree comment below. If not, thank God that your life isn't difficult. :)

My life hasn't been the most gentle path either. I have had my ups and downs and on the way, I have picked up a few lessons that I wish to share with all of you today. It's a new year and as I resolve to make a difference in my life, I wish to make a difference in yours too. 

1. Stop over-analyzing

If you are anything like me, you absolutely over-analyse every single thing you have ever experienced. And I mean it. You will think about conversations long after they have finished, assess behaviors of your crush like a detective, scrutinize every act of your friend' as if they are perfect humans (which do not exist by the way) and evaluate every scolding your parents might have ever showered on you. If you are doing anything like this, PLEASE STOP IT!

That kind of behavior will only ruin your relationships and turn you into a depressed individual surrounded by gloom and apathy. It may leave you feeling unrecognized and ignored, and in the process of evaluating your peers or family, you might overlook their real intentions, creating misunderstandings and delusions. I say this, from personal experience of course, that such behavior only brought me sadness and I ended up distancing myself from my friends 

2. Let it Go

Frozen 2 has been recently released and what better spirit than now to propagate this lesson. Let it go! Let it go! Let it go! (Can you hear the song ringing in your ears? I surely can!) 

Jokes apart, but I think this is the most important lesson that I have learnt in life. I have always been a person who found comfort in re-living the moment, again and again, imagining the same scenario repeatedly, so much so that I literally sucked out the juice from every memory, regardless of how good or bad it was. The problem honestly was not that I was cherishing those memories but rather that I was channeling those memories into emotions and mentally forcing myself to go through all of it again. If it was a optimistic memory, it was all good and merry. But if it was a negative memory it meant re-living the anger, hatred or sadness multiple times. The dilemma with re-living negative memories is that they only intensify these pessimistic emotions. Holding on to memories is good, but holding on to revenge, hatred and mistakes is not good for your mental heath. It is important to let go off people and memories and bury the past behind. Carry only the lessons and positivity forward and you will see your life change for the better.

3. Quality matters more than Quantity 

This is a very popular phrase and I am sure almost everyone must have heard it. Yet we all fail to apply it in our daily lives. When you look at that cheap potato selling for the same price but with a quantity twice that of the organic version, you will still buy the cheap potato. If we can't apply this simple principle to our mundane routines, how could it ever manifest in our real lives. When it comes to friendships, relationships, or even our jobs, this principle does apply. A smaller but tight-knit friend circle matters more than a larger group with weaker intimate connections.  Fewer job experiences but each having a solid reputation matters more than multiple jobs with hardly any rapport. A less number of long-lasting relationships matters more than numerous hook-ups with random strangers. 

Quality matters over quantity. 

4. You can't Please Everyone, so just Please Yourself

Have you ever tried to make someone happy and then miserably failed? I am sure you have. You take all the effort, keep your own happiness aside, make some sacrifices only to realize that they are not pleased with your hard work. Does that ring a bell? I am sure it does. But have you ever gauged the fact that trying to please someone else sometimes only ends up with you getting doubly depressed?Now think about the effort that you put in to please everyone around you- such as a group of friends, your family or your supervisors - if that doesn't end successfully, what are you left it? Only your own melancholic self. 

Every time I have tried to make everybody around me happy, I have always fallen on my face. It never works. All I end up doing is etching the path to my own gloom. So I tried it the other way around. I tried to do what made me joyous and what pleased me. The end result? Everyone around me was happier. Agreed they might not be the happiest souls on earth, but what mattered was that I did not end up disheartened. A word of caution that pleasing yourself does not mean being selfish. It just means caring for yourself a little more than you care for others and putting your happiness first without harming anyone's best interests. It lies somewhere between a spectrum extending from generosity to selfishness. Try it this way and maybe you too might realize that you have found the answer to your unending misery!

5. Change your perspective and the world will change

This is perhaps the most difficult lesson to incorporate into your life, primarily because its very subjective. Every situation demands a different viewpoint. Moreover, changing your perspective is not just about learning a new trait. It is a whole difference in attitude. Humans have never been trained to look at things from a pessimistic point of view, yet we always inherently know to do it. Sometimes we aren't even consciously aware of these patterns. A change in perspective is hence a change in our inherent behavior patterns, somewhat like a change in our basic biology. However, I can assure you that this one change has the power to change the rest of your life forever. It will take time but the effort will be worth it.

Everything that happens, happens for a reason. This is one example of a perspective. Understanding and believing in such a perspective will help you look at your own life with newfound peace and happiness. Another example could be looking at the good in every bad incident. You can choose the viewpoint you think suits you the most and I personally have chosen to cherish the small moments in life and be happy with the smallest of good things that might have happened in the day. Make the choice, make the change, and see your life become better automatically

Let me know if there are any other life lessons you believe in . Lets all share and grow.

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Until then... signing off!

S...