Life Lessons – Clare

With this week-long holiday, I’ve had the time to reflect on my life and a few things I’ve learned from past experiences. It’s good to be given an opportunity to stop and think/reflect like this. Sometimes I feel like I can be too busy to think about how I’m feeling and where I’m going with my life because I’m always thinking about the things I need to do for work or my other responsibilities.

I think it would be nice to share some of the things I’ve learned and reflected on:

I’ve learned that you can’t please everyone. You can live your life trying your best to do so but in the end the only person you’ll end up disappointing is yourself because you let other people’s opinions of you dictate the life you chose to lead. In the end there would be no one to blame but yourself for any regrets you may have because you chose to let others tell you what to do.

People will always have their opinions, we cannot change that. This is related to not being able to please everyone. While other people may have wrong opinions of us, I don’t think it’s up to us to convince them otherwise. You have no one to explain yourself to except yourself and God. Sometimes the best fights are won by not fighting back and by not having to defend yourself. You just need to walk away and let your actions speak for yourself. If their opinions don’t change, it’s their loss and it’s their problem, not yours.

Faith gives you hope. Faith gives you trust. Committing to the Lord all your plans, doing your best and, as they say, letting God do the rest does wonders. I can’t even count how many times I’ve wanted to give up on a lot of things if not for my faith. Considering how wobbly that faith can be sometimes, it’s amazing what faith can do, even if it’s just a tiny bit.

Sometimes, we just take things and ourselves too seriously. Life is short. Enough of the drama – I think our local soap operas give us a fair share of that and it’s enough to last us a lifetime. Let’s live our lives the best we can while we are blessed with the opportunity of having it. So many people have it much worse; I think that’s something we all have to remember when we complain with how things are going with our lives. We are blessed, more blessed than we realize. We have to learn to appreciate and make the most of that.

Photo Source: PC Jewish Pulse