PAGES OF YOUR NOTEBOOK

I remember that as a child, I was very inquisitive as are many kids today.
What is this? Who is this? Why is this like this? Why should I do it like that?... on and on, I always asked questions.

Sometimes, my parents would answer sometimes they won’t.
 Most times they would want me to find out myself.
I slightly remember asking my mum why I shouldn’t put my hand in hot water, she said because it’s hot and it would burn you.
 Been a child, I had not experienced what it means to be burned so the moment she turned her back to me, in my hand went into the bucket of hot water.
It was the scream I let out that made her turn back. Guessing what would have caused me to scream, she went straight for my hand.
 On seeing that I was ok, she looked at me, shook her head and said,’I told you it would burn you, next time, nobody needs to tell you’.

She was absolutely right cause after that experience; I avoided anything that had steam coming from it. I indeed learned from that experience.
As a child, my heart was like a notebook with empty pages. As I go through life events, I can either document my experiences in my notebook or decide not to.
If I am one that documents them, I can decide to go back through them as many times as possible to learn from them or I can end up writing the same thing on every page.
Worse still I can decide to close the notebook and just exist.
What choice have you made?

When we go through events in life, we must make a conscious decision to keep to mind the lessons that should be learnt.

We must open our eyes, ears and heart to learn from our experiences not to make the same mistakes or do the same things that led us to failure. 
We must aim to use this wealth of good or bad experiences for our advancement.
It’s not easy to do this as sometimes we may find ourselves doing those things we have vowed not to do anymore because they resulted in bad experiences but when it becomes recurrent then we have not truly learnt anything from it.
For example, you found yourself in an abusive relationship where you were made to feel worthless and probably inflicted with physical wounds during the time.

After surviving so many life threats, you try your best and end the relationship with this abusive partner.
 After the whole process, you took time to heal and vowed never to date an abusive person again and to leave once you see the first signs of abuse.
A few months after, you meet this handsome gentleman who seemed like your dream come true. After trying real hard to break him in through the protective walls over your heart, you go for dinner one night, you get into an argument and push turns to shove; he shoves you.

That’s a sign, but you ignore it, maybe it’s all in my mind you say to yourself. The next time you argue he slaps you; I must have really annoyed him you say to yourself again.

You help him to rationalize his abusive behaviour not minding that these are clear signs of abuse. You end up staying in a second abusive relationship.
Now tell me, did you not learn anything from the first?

Do you hate yourself so much that you don’t think you deserve better?

What exactly is the problem here?
Listen to me; you have closed your heart to the truth.
You have put your life notebook on a shelf where it has become dusty from lack of use.
You have not learnt anything from your past. I’m not saying here that you should hold on to the pain the past caused you. No.

The most important thing about your past is that it shows you that you can have more control over what happens in your future.

You can become a better you, you can make sure you don’t make the same mistakes again.
You can love more, be wiser, plan better, do things better than you used to.
It’s important to know as believers that even Christ had to learn from his experiences to become that which God destined him to be. Heb 5vs 8-9

You should see your life experiences as a tough teacher who never gives up on you.
The test first, the lesson later.
You should learn from the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Your experiences should give you a new and fresh perspective of viewing things.
How do you learn to make good decisions/choices?
Most times, it’s by making bad decisions and choices.
Don’t just exist; learn to live life to its fullest by learning from experiences you go through along the way.

Life is beautiful.