Have you found yourself experiencing the same past challenging chain of events believing it’s coming around again as some sort of punishment?
Almost like a strange Bill-Murray-Groundhog-Day-movie* type of karmic retribution coming around again. But what if, instead of a punishment, it was actually a replay – a redo -- only this time, you actually get the desired outcome, the prize at the end? A storyline that changes from a Groundhog-Day-movie to one that’s more of The Alchemist**.
That perhaps Life is having you redo that experience not as a lesson, but rather, as a redo to live it as if you were meant to with the lessons you learned from the first attempts.
* Groundhog Day movie tells the story of a cynical television weatherman who covers the annual Groundhog Day event and becomes trapped in a time loop, which forces him to relive February 2 repeatedly.
** The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho (1988), follows the story of a young shepherd, who travels to the pyramids of Egypt to find a treasure that he had recurrently dreams about. On the journey, he has to overcome multiple obstacles, through which he learns valuable life lessons.
What if the first time we experienced these events, we weren’t ready and lacked the required skills to sustain the outcome of this timeline?
What if other moving parts weren’t ready yet, and so in a bid for buying time, Life, the Universe, whatever-you-wanna-call-it, create these stall tactics to ensure everything lines up accordingly?
Sorta like a server in a busy restaurant trying to buy time before that huge table has all decided their orders.
Or maybe it’s a full circle moment where everything and every event has come full circle so you’re now able to continue on with the outcome instead of going back to the start to repeat the level again. This time, you get the opportunity to rewrite the ending.
I’m typically not one to write about current circumstances as they’re unfolding. Mainly because of just that, they’re still unfolding, and thus, the full scope of the story hasn’t been reached. You can’t see the picture while you’re still in the frame.
However, the other day I had a conscious interrupt – or epiphany, if you will – as I walked downtown and mulling over my current circumstances. The thought of “this just feels like where I was this time 6 years ago” popped into my head. And if you want to know how my summer of 2018 went, click here.
Although different in the way it played then versus now, how I felt and where it is leading me from one chapter ending to a new one beginning was all too familiar to me. In that, perhaps this was passing by once more as a the final run-through before I get the prize and move onto and into a new chapter.
Like the summer of 2011. I started a new job that would re-emerge later on while I juggled finishing up another job, transitioned from one long-term friend group for a new one, moved into my own place again, and doing it all with a broken heart. Needless to say, there was a lot of moving and changing parts in my world, with one chapter that was drawing to an end and the whisperings of a new one beginning. All haunting similar to my summer of 2008 where I ended one job for another upgraded job, moved and upgraded my living situation from a tiny, cramped basement suite into a two-storey heritage home with two friends, started a new relationship that would continue for years to come…the last time this storyline had passed but now I had graduated with lessons learned.
As a starving university student back in 2011, I was in the market for whatever jobs that paid the most for the limited time outside of school that I had – perpetually chasing money, and in this new case, gourmet food that came along in the form of scraps left over from weddings. The Ten-O’clock-Pig-Out quickly became our new religion Thursday through Saturdays, as the crew of mostly-university student caterers would load up their plates with whatever culinary food that was left over from earlier in the evening. The casual laidback work this new catering gig provided was exactly what I needed in that moment, both for my summer semester schedule and my meet-new-people mantra post-broken heart.
Weddings are fun but not when you’re working, and not with a broken heart.
To say I was bit of a hot mess that summer is an understatement.
Despite the events differing in how they’re playing out now, I couldn’t help but wonder that instead of viewing this chapter’s end repeating itself as some sort of karmic punishment, perhaps it was repeating itself like Groundhog Day because I’ve passed the tests, learned the lessons, acquired the skills required to successfully pass this phase to move into the new chapter… as a reward.
As I stood on that street corner, a question entered my mind: What if these events were playing out again not as a punishment but now, I was able to get the outcome with the skills acquired from these dry rehearsals?
And although similar events appear to be unfolding again, we now have the greater wisdom to make more informed and different decisions; thus, changing the outcome of the story away from one of challenges and lessons learned, to one of success and happiness… all because we had to first endure the lessons the first time as to avoid repeating them again.
Sorta like when we lose the battle with the final boss only to repeat the level of the game again, but this time with greater knowledge of the way the final boss moves so we can adapt and win the next time around.
It takes a lot of work for Life to orchestrate chance encounters, new opportunities, and page turns -- all containing several intricate components to align those external parts to your daily life and schedule. That as I stood there on the street corner waiting to cross, perhaps all of the events of the past -- albeit similar – has led me to this exact moment, standing on that very street corner, about the pass a stranger who could completely the trajectory of my life. Or, get that job offer that would change my daily schedule, or create the essay that would grab attention and catapult me to a higher level with writing.
Just as in The Alchemist, The Shepard ended up acquiring skills and lessons learned from the side-quests which set him up for success later on. That these series of events took you off of the path you thought you’d be on, which can be viewed as a setback when really, it’s a set up for what’s to come next.
Commentaires