Experiences have the power to mark us indelibly
and can therefore determine our subsequent reactions, responses or attitude in
a similar situation and even remotely non related situations which we may attach
same reactions based on an experience.
I have heard it said of people who for being
spanked as children have made a decision not to have and even not interact with
children so they are not put in a situation where they may have to spank a
child. Others have become wary of relationships avoiding new friendships/relationships
because of a bad experience or more, while many have resigned from jobs on account
of experience etc. Examples abound everyday and this got me thinking about how
we live our lives on the dictates of the PAST without giving the PRESENT or
FUTURE a chance to be experienced.
To most men,
experience is like the stern light of a ship, which illumines only the track it
has passed.
- Samuel Taylor
Coleridge.
Many times we become entirely trapped in the negativity
of an experience and miss out the opportunity to take from the experience and
create for ourselves a happy, full and vibrant life. We withhold ourselves from
embracing life focusing only on what went wrong, what could go wrong, what was
lost and not what stands to be gained, enjoyed and experienced anew.
A failed relationship equates to a promised
failure in future relationships. A broken trust by one translates to a
certainty of broken trust by many. A hurtful past becomes indicative of an
unhappy future. A loss in fortune plays the hands of a doomed destiny and the diverse
dimension plays itself out endless as though on a continuous loop.
The idea that past experiences influence future
experiences was termed continuity by John Dewey. He argued that all
experiences, impact on one's future, for better or worse. Basically cumulative
experience either shuts one down or opens up one's access to possible future
experiences.
“If you will
call your troubles experiences, and remember that every experience develops
some latent force within you, you will grow vigorous and happy, however adverse
your circumstances may seem to be.”
-John
Heywood
I recall growing up the saying ‘experience is
the best teacher’ always struck an ominous note. It was often used when recounting
a bad experience. If something wrong or bad occurred it was usually summed up with
‘experience is the best teacher’ usually delivered in a resigned or stern manner
thereby cloaking experience in negativity as opposed to a possible positive overview
of the event. It was as though experiences could not be used to define the fun,
happy or positive events of life, those which we refer to in happier terms as
memory.
Somehow, ‘experience’ is largely used to
describe a negative event, episode or occurrence. We also refer to institutionalised/acquired
knowledge as experience but for the
purpose of this writing I define experience as the nature of the
events someone or something has undergone. Experience is what is
happening to us all the time - as we long we exist.
Experience is
not what happens to a man; it is what a man does with what happens to him.
- Aldous Huxley
- Aldous Huxley
I have come to view experience as a learning tool;
a guide, much like a map or searchlight light that illuminates to teach, learn
and empower. My experiences shouldn't take me away from living a rich and
vibrant happy life; instead they should cause me to grow, learn, and appreciate
life a little more. They have become to me a purpose shaping manual to be enhance
understanding. Not a definitive of the negative but the promise of a possible
positive reality.
There are two
things that experiences teach us: the first is that we should correct heavily;
the second, that is should not be too heavily.
- Eugene Delacroix.
- Eugene Delacroix.
I choose to open up and live the possibilities
of future experiences… who knows the countless joys they bring.
SPICY
Chrysalis – Speak. Positively. to Inspire. and Cause. to Yield!
