Phases of Life
Life unfolds in distinct chapters. Childhood is a time of discovery and adventure. Adolescence centers on social life. Late teens and early adulthood involve planning and pursuing dreams. At midlife, we assess how those dreams have been realized. In our sunset years, we reflect on the unique curveballs life hurled at us and their impact on our character. Did we become stronger, remain unchanged, or did life get the better of us?
The Dream
As the street salesman in Pretty Woman says, “Everyone has a dream…what’s your dream?”. Life is more meaningful and motivated when driven by dreams, envisioning how we want our lives to unfold and the person we hope to become. However, unexpected curveballs like health problems, career woes, faith crises, and personal betrayals can interrupt or block those dreams. Lamenting these obstacles doesn’t erase them from our narrative, and escaping life’s curveballs is rare.
Preparing for the Road Ahead
While pursuing our dreams, it’s wise to develop resilience and accept that life often unfolds differently than envisioned. It’s common to lament life’s unfairness. Sometimes things exceed our expectations, which we attribute to luck or blessing. When the opposite happens, we despair over the injustice. However, no degree of despair prevents life’s hardships. Learning to bounce back is crucial. Resilience requires accepting that both good and bad will happen and learning to move forward from defeat. Life teaches us to never say never, as disasters strike without warning, never seeking our permission.
Character Creation
It’s satisfying to watch a movie when a character stays true to themselves even in tough circumstances. Icons like Rocky, whose grit, determination, humility and never-say-die spirit inspire us. Characters like Anakin, who succumb to life’s darkness, show the consequences of giving in. We regard as heroes those who keep striving despite life’s knockdowns. Dramatic tension arises when one veers off course, yet we celebrate their return to greatness.
Our lives are like a biographical movie, revealing our character in the face of the unforeseen. Some settle for an adequate life, repeating daily routine without much change or self-improvement, maintaining a “take me as I am” attitude. Others are character critics, delighting in fault finding, gossip, and creating drama instead of pursuing their own growth. Most commendable are those who see life as a quest to become their best self. They set personal goals and develop self discipline, showing no interest in criticizing others. As my mother often said, “if you find fault in another, your next thought should be how you can help them improve or make their life easier”.
Life’s Curveballs
Life is a mix of plans, pursuits, tragedies, failures, and betrayals. Few escape without acquiring wounds that shape our worldview. An unhealthy response is to let these define us, making us bitter and cynical. A healthier approach is to learn from them. We often grow most during life’s toughest trials. How we handle these curveballs largely determines our destiny and happiness. Victor Frankl, an Austrian psychiatrist who survived 3 years in a Nazi concentration camp, wrote Man’s Search for Meaning. He stated, “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way, the way I choose to respond to what you do to me”.
The Karma of Character
Karma reflects back upon us in accordance with the character approach we choose to take: settling for who we currently are, invested in fault-finding and conflict creation, or striving to improve ourselves and others. Often people hope that karma functions as a vex bringing misfortune upon those they dislike, summarized by the catch-phrase “Karma’s a b-tch”. However, karma is more accurately a system of checks and balances, rewarding or punishing us based on our actions. Positive karma rewards those striving for self-improvement and the betterment of others, often returning those good deeds with interest. Sadhguru, in his book Karma, states “Karma means you are the maker of your life. Karma means ultimate responsibility”. He adds, “Karmic accumulation can either be a boost or burden-that is your choice”. Essentially, how we handle life’s curveballs defines our karmic outcome and ultimately becomes our character.
Keep on Climbing
Each person is the star of their own story, and it’s intriguing to see how others face life’s storms and recover from setbacks. As Rocky tells his son, “The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows… It will beat you to your knees and keep you there if you let it. But it ain’t how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done!” A fair-weather approach leaves us vulnerable to inevitable storms. Instead of hoping for fair weather, life is determined by how we handle knockouts, get back on our feet, and keep pursuing our dreams with determination and resilience.
Serenity Amid Life’s Storms
The Serenity Prayer offers timeless advice for inner peace: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference”. Reinhold Niebuhr, its author, valued serenity as the ultimate wish. Serenity is the inner peace and tranquility achieved when negative emotions are quieted.This requires accepting what we cannot change. Acceptance is an attitude that any situation is what it is, acknowledging its difficulty without lamenting its perceived unfairness. The challenge is to accept everything outside our control-essentially, everything occurring outside our own skin. Within our control is what we think, what we say, how we feel, and what we do. Courage is necessary in order to say, think, and do the right thing, aligning our responses with our desired character. Wisdom helps distinguish between the curveballs we can’t control and our choice to respond honorably, which is the ultimate statement of our character.
