Welcome, Ven a gozar!

One of the biggest and most difficult hurdles in life is learning who you are and what you are about. Most people dabble with this process a little in their teens, then the drive to have a family take precedence. As the family grows we have internal rumblings of dissatisfaction and being lost in our thoughts from time to time. Usually with an urge to get away from it all, and rediscover who we are, then reality appears, and it rarely happens. When formerly married people find themselves single again, they go through a modified version of finding themselves, but usually complete only part of the process. They discover how and why they are ok, but their ex partner is not. They generally halt the process at this point for the most part.

For most of us, it is not until our kids leave home, or we are cruising through our forties when we realize we really do not know a lot about us. We know what our beliefs are, and what our likes and dislikes are, but most of us we have no real idea why they are who we are. We only really know that we have been this way all our lives. It is during this period when we really start to find out about ourselves. Some of us like what we find and some do not, but it is generally a time of both inner and outer exploration.

A lucky or perhaps not so lucky minority of people go through this stage early in life. Perhaps in their teens or early twenties. It is much harder to explore yourself when you are younger because a number of life’s tools that come from living are not present. To compound the difficulty many common ideas in the adult world are still new to us, and we think we invented or discovered them for the first time. For anyone who finds themselves in this position, it is best to remember that what you are learning is new for you, but perhaps not new to others.

One area we exploration is finding how we think about the world and our place in it. When we are growing how the world effects us, and our immediate family. People who hold a world view that encompasses the world first, and not themselves are a rare prize. Generally, great struggles have gone on within their core being before they found this new plateau of seeing the world and their place in it.

This is only a minor example of how we change as our life unravels. There is a good learning here that applies to all areas of our lives. If you have ever heard or read the story of the blind men and the elephant you may already know how and why our views change. In the story, some blind men all examine different parts of an elephant and have different ideas of what an elephant looks like.

Whether you are one of the few who have more advanced ideas on the world and your place in it, or are just starting out on the journey and have no idea of how you fit into the world remember everything is perfect in this moment and time, all is as it should be. All roads lead to Rome as the ancient saying proclaims. What is important to remember is that unless you and the person you are discussing life with are touching the same spot on the elephant, your views will be different, and that is okay. Of course each of you will grow at different rates and your views will cease to be the similar, and that is how it should be too.

Conflict in these situations starts when one party forgets that neither party holds the correct view. The correct view is still somewhere ahead on the path of life. As soon as one party involved remembers either holding that view in the past, or that the other person is speaking from a experience level they have not arrived at conflict goes away. We can not pull or force another into our level of life. We can only hope that we are on the right path ourselves, and eventually others will join us.

Comments (1) May 22 2008