Life’s Gains and Losses Are Not Always About Us

Lessons are sometimes dispensed by Life for others who need the most help or the most discernment

A pleasant scenery like this at Hemsworth Water Park is where creative people could drink in the beauty of nature and nurture their creative juices to start flowing copiously. Photo by the author.

When something out of the ordinary happens in our life, most of us would likely take it as something very personal. It happened to us, so it’s personal, right?

I used to think that way, but I learned a lot throughout my long, eventful life.

Challenges in life that we meet along the way are meant to make us stronger, more resilient. They bring out the best in us; they allow us to explore other opportunities out there for the taking.

They push us to better what we assume is our best.

The same with gaining something in life. There are lessons to be learned when rewarded with good blessings.

Let’s say you win big-time in the lottery. Perhaps you’d share the winnings with people close to you, or make a sizeable donation to a charity after your heart.

Maybe you’d choose to give up the job you dislike, and devote your time as unpaid volunteer in an animal shelter now that money is no longer a concern.

The opposite of this good-tidings spectrum is the bad one — let’s say, you left your high-end mobile phone in a cab. This would not be quite a loss if (1) your gadget is insured, and, (2) your important communications and business contacts are saved on cloud.

Or, perhaps someone close has met a fatal accident, which is a tragedy as you loved this person dearly.

We may wallow in grief, or seethe at our loss. Life is unacceptable.

We may fete and feast over what we have gained. Life is good.

The more thoughtful in us would look past the challenges, the victories, the losses, the gains. And the more contemplative in us would reflect that the out-of-the-ordinary occurrences in our life is not always about us.

We gain. We lose. We pick up and learn the lesson. That’s life.

What I believe to be more significant is that such gains, losses and lessons from the self-same situation could also touch other people.

Sure, you lost a loved one to a fatal accident. But this loved one had a donor card. And how many patients awaiting organ transplant surgery would be saved and have a longer life because your loved one perished in an accident?

Or you left your mobile phone in the backseat of a cab. Another passenger found it.

The passenger is faced with a life test: either to have it returned, or bring it to a cell phone hack to unlock the expensive mobile phone for the finder’s own use.

Any choice the passenger chooses to do, in that instance, would reflect a realisation (perhaps later) of what kind a person s/he is.

And that big-time lottery win?

The winner, who chooses to share, is not the only winner here.

The people or the charity or the animal shelter that are chosen to benefit, they are big winners, too. Lives will be touched, likely affecting other lives as well. It is a cycle that could lean both ways.

When life presents us with either a blessing or a trial, a win or a loss, let’s embrace it after jubilating or grieving with a contemplative thought: what lessons must I learn from it?

But also consider that such good fortune or tribulation that comes our way is not always about us.

Lessons in many forms and different levels are dispensed by Life towards others who need the most help, the best guidance, or being saved.

It isn’t always about us.

A few moments in this spot at Hemsworth Water Park is enough to drink in nature’s inspiration. Photo by the author.

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