A Life Memo
To You reading this,
Despite the brevity of life, it can be an interesting journey with many thin lines. Line between good and evil, right or wrong, a forward or backward step. I have often found myself at some of life's junctions, asking what next, which is a point we would all encounter along this beautiful journey of life. So, here are some important principles that have guided me and will keep guiding me. Some may change with time, but regardless, we all make mistakes; never be overly hard on yourself from such, learn from it rather.
Family is an important building block of life; we are born into one without a choice. Do enjoy your childhood, it is gold. If you are past that stage, help children around you enjoy that gold, it would carry them for the rest of their lives. Though, we all never fully grow, we just become more mature children, simply yearning for that gold. Regardless of wherever you find yourself and the childhood you get to experience, never hate your parents (with extreme exceptions, but not hate); they are just humans who also never know the next step at the junction but act like they know. Trust me, most parents regret lots of mistakes they have made during parenting. Then again, the room of errors is part of what makes us humans. Would be boring if there was perfection. Love your parents always, hold hands with your siblings all through life. When you do become a parent, know that you would make lots of mistakes, both as a spouse and a parent, be ready to learn and move on; do not beat yourself up over that. But do avoid extreme mistakes that have no turning back, they cost much.
The most important phase of anyone, I would say, age 8 to 24, really sets up the rest of one's life most times. For the early part of these years, it falls on the parents to build the foundation. People are often lost on what to build into their children and sometimes let chance have its way. Overall, you would want to teach your child the basics of life at this phase: morals, ethics, curiosity, religion, respect to self and others, the importance of learning about anything and everything, teach them to be a sponge for knowledge; history, physics, maths, etc. Do not over-pressure them into fitting what you expect. They learn most from examples, and do correct them when they are wrong; they would tend to be mischievous at times. Overall, help them enjoy their gold while building in an important foundation. The later phase of these years is often where a child begins to explore different paths of life, where you become more of an adviser, emotional stronghold, while still being a guide. Your guiding role drops a bit as they gain more independence, but still of core importance. Hopefully, by this time, they have learnt how to think for themselves, something you should teach them at the early phase, which is core. If you are the child that never got to experience a clear support foundation due to a reason or another, but turned out great, we are proud of you. Become that support foundation for your children.
Success varies a lot by definition and individuality. The ultimate success would be being able to love and be loved, to share this journey of life with people you call family and close friends. Occasionally, things never go as planned (if they ever do at all) but do enjoy the journey. A step further on success would be to give and serve. Success has been coated as a selfish thing these days, that is a wrong path. Genuine and long-lasting success is one of doing good and helping people out. We operate a free market currently; you do good long enough such that there is no option but to reward you. When it comes to the term good, there are variations, but ultimately, do unto others as you would want them to do to you. Be a fighter, understand human nature, be a lifelong learner for everything and anything. Generally, do what makes you happy and brings you peace, but it should never be at the expense of another.
On the topic of religion and races, there are some schools of thought across several things. Generally, have respect for all religions, never disrespect any. Respect should only drop if a religious teaching or religion pushes people to act against the basic laws of life. Loving one another as yourself, respect towards one another, etc. A religion that goes against these should be questioned, notwithstanding the length of practice. If you are part of one, keep an open mind. Towards races, we are all one. Blacks, Whites, Asians, Jews, everyone. We often argue about history and who was wronged and who is being wronged, these are distractions. Humans at core move with four goals: survive, conquer, expand, and reproduce. Without guardrails, we become animals in behaviour, this has played out through wars and at several historical points. This continues to play out to some extent in our daily lives when high level emotions are involved. Not disregarding the pain experienced by the slave trade, the holocaust, or similar, rather bringing an understanding that dwelling on the pain of the past only disrupts the future. Any race could have been the ones to inflict such pain on another, do not say it is impossible. Look at history, we all have our dark sides.
Speaking of dark sides, we do have one on an individual level. Everyone has such, and you do not win the dark by denial, rather by the advancement of self and the placing of guardrails. You know yourself best. For general rules on life as an adult, having strong ethics and morals are crucial. You should have the ability to think for yourself (just make sure you have the right framework or foundation). For spirituality, it is an important aspect of life, I hope you do find your grounds, and it is the right one. While money is important, it should be the by-product of your productivity, and not your top goal. The pattern of money first brings chaos often. If you are ambitious, look at the future you wish to have (some of us may be confused; look at someone else then), and reverse engineer your life towards it. Cherish the ones you call friends and family, enjoy life with them, while you should be positive, we never know what the next day holds. The pain from lost moments of such are rarely healed. Lastly, regarding love, Steve Jobs said it best, "As with all matters of the heart, you would know when you find it. Till then, keep searching." Trust me, you would know when you find it, maybe not immediately, but surely. Just keep growing and being a net positive.
I do hope you win. Take care!