Will it matter in 5 years?

All of us face those moments in life when we get worked up over seemingly insignificant things. For whatever reason, it's so important for us to prove a point at that moment, when in reality, no one really cares either way. Even we can see how ridiculous we're being in that moment, we choose to let all that slip and act in haste, only to regret it as soon as the deed is done. Yeah, you proved a point - SO?

What was the outcome of your action? You disappointed a friend, or worse - lost him/her. I have heard a number of people simply call this "ego", but in the real world, that's not always right. Our actions are usually fueled by a number of things - feelings, ideas, pent up anger at someone, or - you might have had a really tough day, so all someone had to do was pull on your last nerve for you to just snap.

Let me explain this with an example. Ever noticed how sometimes, even the sweetest, most forgiving people act out of haste? I guess it's not always completely their fault. The friend they have been hanging out with could be unbelievably shallow, mildly manipulative and might be unnecessarily competitive. Weirdly, some people even like her pushy nature. The sweet person, who I will call...Tracy, gives in to her very superficial friend, Jane every time. Jane, being the youngest in her family, has this very 'bratty' attitude, gets her way all the time, and is somehow noncommittal and elusive in her opinions. She is a poor judge of character and tends to be a bit too overbearing, and like I mentioned before, competitive - not in the good way.

Tracy is put through hours of listening to Jane boasting about herself a little too much, but when the time comes, and Jane has to deliver, she just doesn't - and this keeps happening over and over again - which means that Jane was just lying to look bigger, when she can just accept that she doesn't know something and learn. Tracy is stuck having to deal with Jane's messy ways for a while. I mean, she doesn't want to, but the situation demands that of her, so she just decides to cut Jane some slack. Tracey doesn't fight because somehow, she feels that it is not going to be worth it, and keeps letting things go. She deals with situations in the 'grown up' way, by trying her best to not be with Jane unless it is that important. She doesn't make a big deal out of it - she just makes plans with others and kinda stays out of Jane's way as much as possible.

The trouble is, however, that when she does end up staying with Jane for a long time, many things that Jane says pisses Tracey off. Tracey remains passive, as usual, but the things that Jane says, although seemingly harmless, is so totally against Jane's beliefs, that in Tracey's head, she just wants to give Jane a piece of her mind, go away, and not see Jane again. This tends to happen each time, when they tend to stay in each others' company for a little longer than necessary. So. on one particular day, she ends up staying in Jane's company for a little too long, and selfish little Jane insists on something that Tracey f**king hates. This brings out the worst in Tracey, and she blows her top by being a sniveling little child who doesn't want to share her toys. Even Tracey regretted it, but Jane is persistent, as usual and gets her way.

By the way, Tracey is completely capable of standing her ground, but only lets Jane have her way because Jane is the kind who will be the big baby and not let something go. In Tracey's point of view, she'd rather give in to many tiny things than to dump it on Jane that she's totally annoying, and have one annoying bitch in her way every time she turns. I see her point. You can only talk about a problem you're having with someone to whom your friendship is really important. If they really want things to work between you, they will make an effort to meet you halfway.

The way I look at it, a real friend is one with whom you don't have to pretend, work or make too much of an effort. Since friendship is the one thing you get to choose, you could go ahead and keep meeting people. You will eventually have a handful of friends who are the best friends you will ever have. Those are the ones who will matter to you, not the rest of them. Life is just like that. Not everyone can "just get along". Sometimes, people are just too different from each other. You must face the fact that you just can't keep putting up with the nonsense that some people hurl at you for no reason for an indefinite period of time. The best thing you can do is to put as much space as you can between you and any negative influence on you, because it is just impossible to have everyone you know love you - at times, you do accidentally step on some toes, but you can't actually do anything else but say sorry and move on.

You wouldn't walk in front of a speeding car, right? Well, it's the same thing when it comes to your emotions. Some people are just bad news in a shiny package. Staying with them in itself is like you walking on top of a particularly tall wall - a disaster waiting to happen. One miss, and you can come crashing down to your death. The more you set well defined boundaries around you, filtering people, allowing different sets of people get to varying lengths, depending on how they treat you is the best way to go. It may sound cruel, but it is the best way to keep yourself immune to all the things people get up to when they don't like you, or if they feel threatened by your success.

Either way, Tracey's thinking is simple. Jane's not going to stick around, and that's one of life's biggest gifts - change. No one person is stuck with another person for life, except in marriage. Now Tracey is the kind who had a difficult life, but got all the good lessons out of it. She met many different, nice people who showed her what really matters in life. She knows what to fight for, and what to let go of. She knows what she cares for, and she's never afraid to show it, because she realizes that life's just too short for drama and bitchiness. To her, life's running out, and she'd rather spend it loving and living than complaining and competing. That's what makes her sweet.

So she looks at it this way - will it matter in 5 years? Does these little fights matter eventually? Is it worth wasting her present obsessing about someone who is not going to be anywhere in her life in 5 years, but in the past? She just chooses to shut herself off emotionally. Yeah, Jane's gonna continue to piss her off, simply by being Jane. Tracey sees that Jane's just Jane. She may try to be so many things, but she's definitely not worth Tracey's time thinking about her. So Tracey chooses to be the bigger person, and decides to focus on her own goals in life - she has so many, and to try to divide her time between other friends, who she feels happy being with. She finds that this new way of living helps make her life very 'liveable', and she cruises through that phase in life with minimal damage to anyone, whereas, Jane being Jane, lived her life as only Jane would - gossip, drama, competition.

And guess what? Tracey looks back at her life now, and says - didn't matter then, doesn't matter now, and it never will matter. She was actually right in moving on. Trying to prove a point with Jane would have been impossible because once Jane has a certain idea in her head, irrespective of whether it is right or wrong, she just puts everyone else down. Besides, why should Tracey fight to prove anything to Jane or to anyone else? What anyone thought of anyone never counted, and it never will count, as long as life goes on, and each person succeeds in what he/she wanted to accomplish.


What I was trying to say is - live your life fully. Don't let anyone else mess it up for you. They have no right to, and no one will guard your life as well as you will. So take the reigns, and work your way through, honestly, honourably, and always be the bigger person, and just let go. If you find it hard, just stop and ask yourself "Will it matter in 5 years?" An honest answer to that question will mostly be "no" - although this will be very, very difficult to accept in that moment, when you just have every reason to show someone what you would do, but it will always help you make the best decision, if only you accept it and let it eliminate all things that don't matter. If you are among people who blow the smallest things out of proportion, then you're in the wrong place, because it is just impossible to live that way. Being honest, sweet and understanding is exactly what will get you the best out of life. Being all over the place never helped anyone, really.

Most people fight for the wrong things, and let go of the right things - this question will also help you make the most of every moment in life because the present is truly a gift, if only you would look at it the right way - because it isn't your past that will define your future, and at present, your future is still non-existent, so the place where you are charged with so much power to design your future is in this moment of "here" and "now". Have lofty goals. No one got arrested for dreaming big. It is in those dreams and your work at present that you find solace that where you're heading, it's going to be wonderful. That thought fills you with hope, and hope is what life is all about.

In all honesty, life isn't about the beginning, the end or what is thrown your way. It is about how you lived through it, and what you did with every moment that was gifted to you. So, live a good one, then, no matter how you meet your end, you will go peacefully, accepting that your work is done here. You might only feel the need to say your last goodbyes, but never will you need to make peace with anyone in your dying moment, because you were the bearer of peace, not hostility.

True that. However, I suppose that everything in its limits would be beautiful. As hard as it is to believe, love would also be one of those things. Most relationships end badly only caz one person loved too much, and the other just didn't or couldn't love enough. 

On what matters..

I agree. Often, we need to keep fighting for what's right - anything else would be absolute hypocrisy. Justice is paramount, even in the most tiniest of things, so fighting will be like a game - you play fair, or you reap the fruits of your dishonesty at some point. That's the best thing about life is - you can't always get away with playing dirty. Things catch up to you in some way or the other - people may not see you being punished, but you get punished, nonetheless.

In the grand scheme of life, what's big is small, and what's small is big, so humility and righteousness, although little and often seemingly irrelevant in the present, reign in the long run.

On Happiness, people and life.

Today's thought on "My mind talking":

When it gets down to the quick of it, each of us has a different set of things that would really give us genuine happiness, a different set of things we are willing to overlook, and a different set of things we can't stand.

What eventually keeps us connected are our flaws. I like to think of flaws like perfume. Some brands of flaws are intolerable to some of us, whereas others are okay - tolerable, at the most. Yet other flaws are things we barely even notice, and some brands, we love because we can just connect with it for whatever reason. The choice is very personal, very unique. Not many individuals agree to the same extent on one brand or the other.

Our peer group eventually depends on these little things, since friendship is the one thing we can actually choose in life - most other relationships are what we are given, and have almost no choice in, eventually.

We sometimes have friends who are so different from us, and we still tend to have a special connection. Some relationships in life just cannot be named, branded, labelled or explained. They just happen. They are special, but best left unbranded and not dissected, analysed or questioned, caz that would only kill it.

It is when we meet people we just can't connect with or share views/ideas with that we miss those with whom friendship, in general was no effort or worry. It was just everywhere, like the air we breathed in, and it was really as easy as breathing.

Those times were special not because of the place we were in, but the company. We could tell each other just anything, and not feel judged. We weren't too judgmental or suspicious. We just took each moment as it came, not worrying about the next.

I believe that it is rare to meet people with whom there is hardly any worry where judgement is concerned, and it is even rarer when you share ideas on a topic and find your views to be the same. This is when friendship transcends the platonic exchange of greetings, tidings and ideas, and becomes kinship, which is a much deeper feeling - a genuine connection.

Occasionally, we get so lucky that we meet someone, who is practically the same person as you are. In these moments, the happiness is just inexplicable.

Either way, life is life, people will be people, and true friends will be friends, even when they don't talk anymore. Situations and circumstances change many things, but, in all honesty, the only true friend each person really has is himself/herself.

To be self aware and independent is a rare gift. With independence, discernment and confidence, the world is yours, because you are bound by nothing, not held back or tied down to anyone or anything - because, in reality, love and friendship is a good thing, but too much attachment only brings pain because there's simply too much to live up to.

The world is a huge place, where the permutations and combinations are seemingly endless. It's all in good fun, to make the best of the life that was given to us. God wouldn't have filled the world with the good and the bad if he didn't want us to experience it all.

Lessons in moral values were not given to us to live the life hermits. We're ordinary human beings for a reason. Those lessons were taught to us so that we could see every side to life - the good, the bad, the ugly - and still come back the way we went in, with probably just a little more of a story to tell. Those lessons just help us take all our experiences in life, and to know what to do with it. To eventually make the right decisions in life.

SO LIVE, LOVE, LAUGH, SMILE - MAKE THE BEST OUT OF EVERY MOMENT, CAZ YOU WILL ONLY REGRET WHAT YOU DIDN'T DO. Besides, life is too short to live with regret.

"At the end of the day, all you really have is your story. Just try to live a good one." (The Drover)