Ahhhh, the way things look so easy.  Have you ever looked at someone’s life from your eyes and thought I could do sooooooooooooo much better?  Yep, you have.  I have. We all have! It’s easy to judge, solve and even determine just how one could do soooooo much better with what they have in their possession.

From friends, people we know or people who appear to have more and do less to employers and even parents; it’s easy to look from the outside and judge how one could have performed, should have accomplished or how we would have done more, been better.  Again, that’s an outside view.  Not that we do not judge, make assumptions, discuss and/or decide how people can or could have done things differently; everyone at some point has done it.  However, there is a difference between analyzing the thoughts, patterns and ideas of another and recreating scenarios and falling into the traps one says he or she that they want to avoid.

I wrote a previous blog about being reflective.  There is a difference between being reflective of and about your past; and rewriting the events in your mind to appear to be a victim in every scenario.  To view oneself in this manner may seem real at the time but is really unrealistic.  No one can be the victim all the time.  We are the product of the things that happen to us as well as the things we allow and choose.  However, there are more disturbing patterns that emerge from generation to generation.

Those patterns are the behaviors of those who tend to repeat patterns that were once destructive to them as children, in their adulthood as parents.  You know that child of a single mother who then becomes a single mother herself, that young boy who was angry at his father and his decision but finds his or herself repeating the patterns that hurt him as a child.  In reviewing behavior, too often people find it easy to judge others rather than reviewing their personal motives and behavior.

The thing is, as people AND ESPECIALLY CHILDREN, we do not always see the patterns, ideas and thoughts that are adopted, formed and accepted from our parents, even the bad habits, especially the bad habits!  That’s why it is crucial to be reflective in the decisions one makes.  While we learn from the past, it is detrimental to react or act based solely on the past.  We make the best decisions from the LESSONS LEARNED from the past, not the pain, not trying to correct the past in the present, not rewriting time but being truthful to ourselves in EVERY SITUATION, THE GOOD, THE BAD AND YES, THE UGLY!

Disappointed in your parents or a mentor?  Hurt from the past? Confused about choices made?  Ask, seek answers and before you judge, take a second look and gain understanding about what you see, hear and think.

 

Kimberly Davis