The ways of the universe are mysterious enough that puny humans like us don’t get it. I’m sure that’s true all the time, but especially right now, it seems particularly poignant. I’m speaking about lessons here.
When I first traveled back to Toronto from Thailand (which is like my first home), I didn’t think that I would still be in Toronto 8 months later, due to the pandemic and travel ban in the world.
I thought I would stay for a few months, five or six at most, and then skedaddle my way back to Chiang Mai, where I live most of the year.
The universe had other plans.
I was not the only one the universe had alternate plans for. Many of my friends from Chiang Mai, who had left there to go back to their home countries, were stuck there now.
The reason I’m fascinated by this particular scenario is because I believe the universe always has a reason for doing everything. There’s no time that it doesn’t know exactly what it is doing.
In fact, all of these situations that we label as coincidences are usually not so.
Why Does the Universe Teach Us Lessons in This Manner?
The reason why the universe sends us lessons in this pre-packaged fashion is because human beings as a whole are an unconscious bunch. We are roaming about the world, completely unaware of the bigger picture.
We don’t know anything, but we think we know everything.
Our eyes are closed, but we think they are open.
We don’t know the full consequences of our actions and lives, until a lot later, in hindsight.
The universe knows this about us, and thus, it sends us lessons not as bright neon sign blinking away at us (although it does do that sometimes and we mostly ignore it), but through circumstances that we just can’t ignore.
If the universe had let me merrily go back to Chiang Mai, without any consequences, hurts, or problems, I wouldn’t have realized how much I truly love Chiang Mai, how much I miss it, how much I want to be there.
But also, I wouldn’t have realized that I have a lot of work to do on myself and my relationship with my family, and I have even more work to do on my finances, and my business.
These are lessons that came hard. But at least I understood them, because of the tenuous circumstance I was placed in.
If Life Was All Comfort and Joy, Would We Ever Learn Anything?
When things are going well, and nothing obstructs our path, we get complacent. We forget about the tough times, and we even start become a little cocky about things.
We might even start becoming blasé about things, not appreciating them enough, which is the real shame of it all.
To be perfectly honest, I was starting to become irritated with some of the things in Chiang Mai as I had been there for a while. I was beginning to take it all for granted: the weather, the food, the people, the freedom.
My bad, I tell the universe now. My bad, indeed. I will try not to repeat this mistake again.
This time when I go back, I’ll have inculcated the lesson of missing Chiang Mai and its goodness so much that I will never (never say never, but still) make this mistake again. I hope. Fingers crossed.
What are such lessons for you? Is the universe trying to teach you a lesson as well right now? I know the universe has a lesson for humanity as a whole with this pandemic, but each one of us has a lesson to learn as well.
What is your lesson? And have you learned it yet? If not, what are you waiting for?
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