Life Changing Lessons

It’s been a while since I last wrote something for my blog.

This past year has held quite a lot of learnings. Some through experience, some through reading and a little more through others. The purpose of my blog was to share my thoughts, teachings and ideologies with you. With that in mind, here are the top three things I’ve learned over this past year:

All three lessons fall under the umbrella of RESPECT.

Respect is vital for any relationship to exist and thrive; and, it’s not something you just give to everyone. It’s earned.

• Sometimes you will never receive closure, and that’s okay. That’s a reflection of the people who couldn’t provide you closure. Not a reflection of you. More importantly, it is showing you just how much they respected you.

Quite an impactful incident occurred in my life that forced me to understand the aforementioned. That incident left me speechless, initially, then filled with questions once I had fully wrapped my head around it.

“Why was I being blindsided?”

“Who had started this entire incident?”

“Why had it escalated to such an extent?”

“Why hadn’t some of the people involved provide me with the information I deserved to know?”

All the answers I sought were in the hands of others, unfortunately. There was only one way for me to get closure - ask the people involved. Thus, I reached out, intending to have a mature conversation. However, all my attempts to receive closure were unsuccessful. To put it simply, no one was answering questions. Rather, I was just getting political answers, vague and lacking in accountability. The time between the question being asked and receiving the response was increasing as well.

I made a realization: I was CHASING for answers that anyone in my situation deserved to know. So, my questions changed. Rather than seeking their answers from others, I sought them from within.

“What does all of this mean?”

“What soul lesson am I being taught?”

The more I asked these questions to myself, the more clarity I began to have. I was being taught a huge lesson about respect. My soul was being forced to go through a series of events that would teach me all that I needed to know about respect.

While I deserved to know the answers to my questions I asked the others involved, I wasn’t given them and that left me feeling betrayed and hurt. But, I learned something much bigger than all of it. I learned how little the others respected me. If they had respected me, I would have been given the answers. Now, if I have realized how little they respect me, I shouldn’t be wanting closure from these people. Not at the cost of my disrespect.

Once I comprehended this, I felt immense peace rush through me. I was finally learning the lesson.

• Some people deserve compassion, NOT your respect.

Allow me to give you an example. Let’s take a hypothetical situation here. A family is suffering after finding out about the wrongful doings of their son during his time in university. They begin to shift the blame away from their son to anyone else involved in their son’s life. This escalated the situation as more people got involved. The family then begins to express their emotions. Valid. But, this expression forms a self-loathing behaviour and ambushes the others that they’ve blamed.

Now, tell me, if you were there when they expressed their emotions, what would be running through your mind?

You’d immediately try to comfort the family. You’d feel compassionate towards them. However, soon enough, that compassion turns into respect. But tell me this, did they earn that respect? Or, did they utilize the situation to their advantage and create respect at the cost of other people?

What I mean to say is, did they really earn your respect? Or did you just give it to them because you were blinded by compassion and you couldn’t see how they manipulated the situation to their benefit?

The hypothetical example I provided can occur in all of our lives. So I want you to understand the following:

In situations like the hypothetical one, the family deserved your compassion because they were hurt and in pain. They did not earn your respect. They could have, ethically, by maturely dealing with the situation. Instead, they chose to handle the situation by shifting the blame to others.

Respect is never earned at the cost of ambushing others. Give someone compassion until they earn your respect.

• When someone uses their authority to disrespect you, force you to do something outside of your comfort zone, even after you have set your boundaries clear, it is NOT disrespectful to speak up.

This one is rather hefty. As South Asians, we’ve grown up being told that anyone older than you MUST be respected. Their authority leads to their entitlement towards respect. I agree, to an extent. You should respect their experience and wisdom in life. But not due to their authority.

This authority gets misused as the child is expected to respect the elder, aunt, uncle, etc. regardless of whether they respect the child. I have witnessed this myself.

I was once in a situation where not only was I not being heard or carefully listened to, I was being cornered into admitting something that was far from the truth. I was constantly interrupted. My vision was being blinded by the authoritative behaviour that stood in front of me, expecting me to give respect even while I was being disrespected through tone, body language and behaviour. I’m sure each one of you has been through a similar situation, as this is quite a vague description. Soon enough, as with any situation, an apology was provided. However, this next event astonished me. The apology was not enough - PROOF was required. Once again, I was blinded. This time it was because all I could see was their inner child, childhood traumas and unhealed wounds.

I was aware of the quote “what you don’t heal will bleed onto others''. Surprisingly, that’s exactly what was happening. Their unresolved traumas, subconscious beliefs and unhealed wounds were being projected on to me. At that moment, pity and some form of compassion rushed through me. Though, I quickly snapped back to reality and did what was asked of me - provide proof of my sorriness.

Months went by and I started to ask myself the same few questions.

“What was I being taught?”

“What lesson does my soul need to learn?”

You had set your boundaries and were forced to go out of your comfort zone. Furthermore, disrespectful behaviour was being used towards you. You were not being respected. In fact, you were made to feel incredibly uncomfortable. Someone’s authority does not entitle them to respect. It’s earned. So, speak up. Be mindful of your manners, but speak up.

These 3 lessons changed my life completely and while I had to experience things to learn them, I hope you can learn them through me.

Every human on this Earth is worthy of respect for simply being human. You must give them that much respect. However, any more than that, it must be earned. Respect is earned, not just handed out.