Lessons.
They are everywhere, it seems. I’m not sure where to begin when it comes to learning lessons, as I believe, it is a substantial part of our purpose as humans.
To define that word, lesson, Webster tells us that it can be an amount of teaching given at one time. Or a thing to be learned by experience. Sometimes, though, it is an occurrence or example that serves to warn or encourage us.
Now! Let that be a lesson to you!
We start out knowing nothing. Then, little by little, we just start knowing stuff.
I can’t remember when I learned to read. I don’t remember leaping for joy, or voraciously reading everything I could lay my eyes on. I have no recollection at all. But clearly, that was a big lesson. Or learning 2 + 2 = 4. We find out, a small bit at a time, how things work.
Like telling time.
But the truth is, we don’t tell time. It tells us.
No one has it all figured out. And, despite what some people think, nobody has all the answers. Let’s face it. There’s no shame in saying “I don’t know.” No one is perfect. Never has been. Never will be.
Undoubtedly, we all make mistakes. But hopefully, we learn as we go.
I love those little moments in life when I realize there is a better way. Most of the time, it is something so simple. Like a better way to wash the dog or a new way to chop pickles. Yet, there are those gleaming moments when it is something quite large and impactful. Some moment, when we say out loud, “Holy Heckins. Now ain’t that a thing!” I’ve never had an “aha” moment like Oprah proclaims. But I’ve had lots of “Holy Heckin” moments, that’s for sure.
There are many more dimensions to lessons, though. First and foremost, the things that people teach us — or try to teach us — aren’t always true. There is a difference between learning a lesson and learning a truth.
Someone can teach you, for instance, that slavery was just a bunch of black people, working in exchange for room and board. They might teach you that gay people are evil or mentally ill. Or they could teach you that the moon is made of cheese.
And depending on your circumstances, you might learn those lessons and believe them to be true. Like flat earth. Or stolen elections. Or that bacon and eggs don’t go together. But all those things turn out not to be true at all. And this turns out to be a large problem — the actual teaching of the lessons.
Most of the time, if we are paying attention, and if we are open to the possibility that we don’t know everything — we learn our lessons naturally, as they come.
We stick the knife in the toaster. Once. We let our cars run out of gas. Once. We take a fish sandwich on an airplane. Once.
We learn. We know. We grow.
Possibly, though, our biggest lesson comes when we learn to be grateful. We learn to appreciate even the simplest thing, like sipping a bottle of orange soda on the front porch, as it sweats, right along with us. Or a squirrel enjoying an apple on a branch above. Because once something is gone, we realize how incredibly wonderful that thing really was. And we miss it.
Today, I am thankful for it all. For this place, I am standing right now. And I am grateful, too, for my every lesson.
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Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood.
— Helen Keller
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Experience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first, the lesson afterward.
— Vernon Law
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I think the one lesson I have learned is that there is no substitute for paying attention.
— Diane Sawyer
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