5 Truths We (Should) Know, But Often Forget

I. On Moving Forward

There will come a time when you stop, look at your tracks, and realize you’ve made such a mess of everything for the first time. You won’t know how you got there. You won’t know why. You won’t know who to blame. You won’t know where to start and where you’re headed. It’s going to be scary. It’s going to feel like it will last forever. And it will happen again and again. But you will wake up one morning telling yourself that everything will be alright, and actually believing it.

II. On Friendship

Some of the people closest to you will look you in the eye and consciously say hurtful things. Not as a wake up call or intervention though, but just for the sake of hurting you. You’ll learn that some people will step all over you and stomp on you when you’re already on the ground. It will happen.

You’ll learn that not everyone around you is looking out for you. Beware of the people you surround yourself with. Real friends are the ones who don’t make you feel like you have to work for your friendship; real friends are the ones who are there with you no matter what you go through but the ones who call you out when you screw up. People build social networks for reasons; remember that friendship and networking are not always synonymous.

III. On Nostalgia

You will notice that people you knew so well before are not the same people now. You grow up. You grow apart. It’s not always the end of the world, though. As Darwin put it, it’s natural selection. Memories are only kept alive when you have people to remember them with. Without them, those memories eventually erode with time, distorted and reconfigured with your own subjectivity. Memories are in the past, and the past is in the past. Things end for a reason.

Nostalgia will bite you in the ass one day, but kick it away and shove it under the rug before its teeth sink in, because it will come with its companion, Grief.

IV. On Speaking Up

You will kick your self in the butt because you know you’ve either said too much, the wrong thing, or on the contrary, not said anything at all. Voice out your opinion. Voice out your emotions. Write it down, draw it, sweat it off, cry it out, whatever. But respect whoever you are voicing it out to, no matter what the circumstances are. Respect goes hand-in-hand with listening.

Oh, and if you don’t have an opinion, start thinking about your priorities in life.

V. On Decisions

You will have to make more and more important decisions and people are not always going to hold your hand and guide you to make the right ones. Your decisions, at the end of the day, are ultimately yours. You will mess some up, you will get lucky with some, and your gut feeling will tell you what you really want to do. Some people will not understand your choice. Some will not support it. Some may get disappointed and some will get hurt. You will regret some. But you will also definitely make the best ones of your life.

Your life is your journey. Just like deciding to turn left or right at a fork, your decisions, your mistakes and your triumphs will determine your path in life and what you will see on the way.

Enjoy the view.