Shine or Decline, Struggles defines !

EMBRACE STRUGGLES WITH GRACE OR STRUGGLES WILL NOT LEAVE YOUR TRACE

Struggles can make you a better person, just embrace it with grace. They should be moulded to commendable success stories which you can be proud of and set examples for others.

But, is it what happen around us?

Most of the people love to talk about their sufferings. How they are going through tough times in life, How their life got devasted by the loss they suffered, and how they feel it’s impossible to come out of it. Their records just suddenly get struck at one same tune for rest of their lives – “I have lost my business or a loved one and much more and there’s no way I can come out of it”

 In this ever-changing world, everyone is struggling in their own ways. Some do it happily while others take it as a suffering and are doing it just for the sake of it.

The former lives with the attitude “ I am strong, I will pass through this storm,” while the latter perceive it as a deep dark hole that nobody can escape and often wonder “Why is this happening to me?”’

What they fail to realize is that there is always a silver lining in everything and if you can’t see it, then you might be looking at the wrong place because it must be there.

You may know, how the process of refining requires the silversmith to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames are the hottest so as to burn away all the impurities, that’s when it becomes the best in its purest form. Think about god holding us in such a spot. All of us are just like the piece of silver going through these tough times posing as the fire and all we need to do is to hold on and wait for the time when we’ll come out of it shining like the moon, more evolved as a person.

Hence, it is when we are tested that we are able to rise, push through and come out the other side stronger, braver and better.

Struggle has different meanings for different people. People fight their wars in different languages.

But, small or big, if you handle it well it would go on to be a part of your success story. If you don’t, then it becomes that bump in your life which you never want to jump over just because you think that’s the end of life.

We should know, that no one volunteers to struggle. We all crave to have that photoshopped versions of our own lives that would fit perfectly into an Instagram square. But life does not work like that. Every one of us would have to face it whether we like it or not.

Just observe around you.  you will find tons of different perspectives towards life.  

 Let me share a real-life story to showcase people perspective towards struggle.

 The first story is of a six-membered family- father, mother, three sisters and a brother. This family encountered with the loss of their father, mother and eldest sister, which pushed the 17 yr old girl to stand up for the family which was left. She fought tooth and nail to give the best life she could to her younger brother and sister.

She managed to settle down and went on taking care of both of them over a period of two decades and earned a respectful life. What I’m trying to emphasize here is, that she also had an option to mourn for the rest of her life, begging other people to help or maybe to become a burden on someone, but she decided against it.  She never broke, she never asked for help once.

As fate would have it, once again after three decades, her younger sister passed away in an accident leaving her three very little kids behind. She stood again, fought again, she even sacrificed her own life for them before giving a second thought. She accepted the challenge of life and started afresh, and she is still working tirelessly, looking after those kids and is the biggest pillar of strength behind her brother’s family as well. Not to mention, she never started her own.

 She devoted her entire life sacrificing alone for her family and would definitely not blink an eye if she would again had to do so. The shocking part is, she never shares what she has gone through in life, never accepts help from others and never use her pain to get sympathy. For me someone so selfless is no less than the GODDESS herself.

 On the other hand, to make the other side clear, I also know a family who lost their mother in an accident at an early age of 45. This family got disconnected from everyone over a period. They shadowed themselves behind the big loss. Although. they struggled to overcome this damage but lost decades talking about the incident and analyzing who helped them and stood behind in tough time and who did not.  They lost all that precious time of life where they could have lived it way more differently but all they could do was deny and never accepted the fact that it is life and it throws and will always throw new challenges every day. We need to live with it. They forgot that the people may sympathize with them but that too not for long and in the long run they would only remember them always cribbing about the things which have long been done and which no one can do anything about.

Everyone wants to remember those who overcame the hurdles and still have the courage to fight many more so that they can learn from their success stories. 

 Struggles are a part of everyone’s life, even Lord Rama, the GOD himself, had to struggle throughout and in the end, he was defined by how he bravely he fought and overcame his struggles in life by moving on the right path.  

The truth is, there are some important lessons in life that we only learn when we go through difficult times and they can become our silver lining to the darkness. Like:

Who are your real friends:  It’s an unfortunate and a brutal truth to learn that whether someone we once thought would be there for us no matter what can actually be counted on. Difficult times have a unique way of trimming off the useless fat in our lives. The bunch of people we carry around proudly may just turn out to be our hollow investments; if someone do not truly cares, they will not make the effort to be there. Period.

Analyze depth of your strength : Nothing builds our strength more than surviving catastrophes. Nothing else forces us to get leverage of all we have, to dig deep and come up with every ounce of integrity, patience and fight which is inside us.

What really matters in life: Half of the time we chase materialistic things. Struggle helps to give us a clearer definition of truly matters and worthy. People spend most of their lives worrying about everything else but what holds importance.  

How to be grateful: Grave times leave us with a lasting impression. They alter us and change the way we view our lives. We learn who and what matters in our life and undoubtedly we have a greater appreciation for them. Surviving hardship gives us a broader perspective on what hardship really is. You will find yourself looking back on the things you used to complain about and be thankful they are your only worries. After we pass a storm, deep gratitude for life is embedded in us at the end .

 Everybody is fighting, they may look like any other happy face around, but we would never know what they may have gone through in life to achieve that successfully.

So, embrace struggles happily, they define you. It may help you lead others. You can be the lamppost to others; guide people by sharing the way how YOU handled your rough time in life.

With this, I’ll leave you to just think calmly about what you can do and what all can be done with the lemons life is giving you. You can either just stop at making a forceful tasteless lime soda, or you can go on to create a whole different flavoured mojito for yourself.

 Be composed, go deep down and always remember- tough times never last, tougher people do!