If I Knew Then What I Know Now: A Letter to Hareena’s Past Self

Dear, Me (5 years younger)

There are SO many things I could tell you about your future and how things turn out, but everything happens as it should. When things do not go as planned it is critical to learn how to pick yourself back up and learn to go with the flow. No matter what I tell you, from the future, it will not change the events of your life that will lead you to where I am today. You will have smoother transitions in life if you realize the changes that need to be made sooner.

Family, they will always be there, but they are not the ones living your life. Your family will support you in whatever it is that you want to do and your actions will affect them. However, your happiness is most important. You have to live with yourself and if you are not happy about what you have decided, then it is YOU that has to face yourself in the mirror everyday. So, listen to everyone, take their advice, but in the end do what you want to do. Listen to what your heart and mind are saying to you, it will make the difference and you will be more at peace with yourself.

Do not be afraid of change. There will be a point where you will have to leave everything behind; your childhood, your friends, your neighborhood. You will have to learn how to adjust to the change and you will have to learn how to figure things out for yourself. Learn how to break away from the comfort of your normal everyday life, learn to welcome the change and look at it as a new beginning, a new opportunity to learn.  

Figure out what you want to do and DO IT! The sky's the limit and do not let ANYONE tell you, “you can’t.” If you waste your time listening to people who tell you this, you will begin to believe it. You will be stuck with nowhere to go and stray away from your purpose. Essentially, you will be wasting your valuable time. The feeling of being lost will overcome you causing you to lose purpose. The only way you will figure out what you want to do is to try new things! Do not stop yourself from trying new things, that next thing you try, just may be what you were meant to do. Do not settle for less than what you deserve.

A part of living is dying. People will come and go, but it's especially hard to lose someone that is close to you. It is even harder to lose someone that you NEVER got a chance to know. Never miss out on the opportunity to speak to anyone, no matter how close or distant the relationship is. You never know when your conversation will be the last one.

This next piece of advice that I am about to share with you may sound a bit odd, given our history, but try to care less. There will be people that come into your life that you will care too much about, and it will seem as though they do not even care whether or not you are even breathing regularly. Be kind to everyone, and do not show any one any negative feelings.There will be those few people that will be there for you when you need them and those are the people you need to care for. Put the effort in showing them that you care. A Mark Twain quote comes to mind, “Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.” So, if you care less about the people that do not blink an eye for you, you will have more time to focus on yourself and the people who deserve your attention, you will endure less suffering.

Sincerly,

Hareena (from the future)

If Today was Your Last Day...

We all go through that phase where we think that we are invincible, no one and nothing can harm us. But we will all realize that we are all gonna die one day. So, how do you want to be remembered? How will you leave your mark on this world? Life is short! We are always hearing stories of young people losing their lives before making their mark on the world, and that they had so much to live for … but the truth is that we do not know WHEN we are going to die, and who are we to say that this person did not take full advantage of their life. Death is tragic and unexpected no matter what the case may be, old or young, how do we know what kind of life the person lived? Yes, it is unfortunate if a 16 year old loses his/her life but, it is much worse for those of us who are left to deal with the loss, because they are no longer here. However if it is a 95 year old, we do not think twice about how this person got to live a “full” life, we will still miss them but knowing they lived so many years offers us a better form of closure. The number of years that we live does not determine the quality of life we live. As Abraham Lincoln once said “In the end, it’s not about the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.” So whether it be 16 amazing years on this planet or 95 long years, make it count! Tomorrow is not a promise so you have to make the best of it.

I recently found out that someone I knew a while back passed away, and naturally I began to think about how amazing this person was. This person was only in my life for a short while, but they left a mark on my life. Their kindness and positivity motivated me to strive and work for what I want out of life. This person will never know the effect they had on me, because I got the inspiration from ONE conversation we had. I can only imagine how this person affected others … this was the single memory of them that had a lasting impression on me, one memory, one encounter in a sea of people who had also been touched by this person. This has got me thinking about the mark I will leave behind. How will I be remembered? I DO NOT live my life according to what others think. People are going to judge you no matter what you do or say, so I strive to be happy, and as I have said many times before, I want to leave a positive mark on those around me. After I came to this realization, I became more self aware of my actions and of my words. I want to be remembered as a kind hearted person because as Maya Angelou once said, “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” Emotions are powerful! Kindness is key to leaving a lasting impression on someone. If you give time out of your day to just listen and to offer some words of kindness others will remember that.

How you live your life is how people will remember you. However you should not live your life based on how people will view you, it is YOUR life and you only get one, make the most of it, be happy. We all get wrapped up in our lives and we focus on our careers so that we can build ourselves up in order to get that promotion, or to buy that new house or car.  All this is important, but we need to balance our lives. We need those things to live in our society. If you do not have money, you do not have the conventional means of survival, yet you also need to maintain your mental health, and cultivate the real meaning behind life. We need to stop and look at what really matters in life, we need to cultivate the relationships that mean the most. Quality over quantity, focus your energy on something that feeds your soul. Invest your time into parts of your life that make you enjoy living, time is precious! Don’t waste it.

Death is inevitable, you have a choice in how you live and let live, the trick is to be you, and do no harm to others. Leave a positive mark, inspire others to be the best they can be, and they will remember you for that. You never know when you are going to pass away so make sure to always create positive, fruitful memories with the ones you care about. Spend your time carefully, do not let another second pass you by and feed quality moments to your life. Live every day like it’s your last.

~Be happy and don’t dwell on the past, live in the present and welcome the future with open arms.

Lets Take a Trip Down Adventure Lane

3am:  I’m sitting with my friend in the dorms and we look at each other. He says to me, “Edith I’m bored let’s go do something!” I look back at him and say “Okay, let’s go” We get up off our lazy asses and head out the door. We couldn’t decide what to do but we just kept walking on campus and talking about our long and strenuous day. When we get to the top of the hill, there are two individuals talking to each other. One of them was laying flat on the floor as if he were bored out of his mind. The other guy was standing idle looking straight at my friend and I. We approach them and say “Hey, what’s up?” the one on the floor said “Bored as fuck, what about you guys?” My friend and I looked at each other and we both giggled and responded simultaneously, “same.” We followed up by introducing ourselves and they introduced themselves. The guy that was standing asked us why we were walking around campus at 3am and my friend proceeded  by telling them that we wanted to do something. I returned the question and they told us that they felt a strong desire to be outside. I immediately introduced the idea that we should go exploring and everyone agreed, the guy on the floor shot up from the floor and screamed “LET’S GO!”. The night was young and we set forth on an adventure less than half planned. We were going to go to the cave on campus :O. None of us had flashlights but we didn’t need them, the moon was high in the sky and so bright that it lit the path all the way through. When we got to the cave we had to use our phones, everything was pitch black inside but we were having a blast. Finally, we finished exploring inside the cave and decided it was time to head back out to the world. We walked our new acquaintances back to their dorms and my friend and I parted ways. When I got back home it was almost 5am and I was EXHAUSTED to say the least but it was all worth it. Even though I never saw those two explorers again I knew that all four of us shared an experience together of a life time.    

Some of the best adventures are spontaneous and risky, but that’s the best part about them. We need to be more spontaneous, life is short and we never know when we will seize to exist. Don’t let let life happen to you, make life happen! One of the most fulfilling experiences one could go through is to feel alive, filled with enough adrenaline to take over the world. Take chances and see where life takes you and what it has to offer you. Feel ALIVE! DARE TO BE ALIVE >:D If you haven’t felt scared shitless or excited beyond belief, you haven’t lived yet. Don’t be afraid to feel emotions and don’t let your fear of the unknown prevent you from living life to the fullest.

Ask yourself this, when was the last time you took a trip to the beach? When was the last time you went star gazing? When was the last time you tried something new? When was the last time you said ‘fuck it! I’m going to drop everything I’m doing so I can do what I want!” Now ask yourself, Why? … What is preventing you from taking a spontaneous trip down adventure lane? Part of living life is about experiencing the unknown and taking risks. You will accumulate so many meaningful memories that in the end you can say it was all worth it.

Instead of spending money on a bunch of designer clothes, designer shoes, designer bags, expensive jewelry, spend it on experiences. Those materialistic “things” won’t help you grow as person nor will they help broaden your perspective and they won’t give you something to share with the world. You can’t say much about a designer bag other than how much it costs, whereas when you talk to someone about an adventure, there are endless stories and make for intriguing conversation. There’s nothing wrong with designer items but I personally do not find them very interesting.

Enough about bags back to the topic. One day you and I will die and that is the sad truth. When you have memories of well lived moments with people you love, it fills you and helps to complete you. People aren’t going to remember you for the ‘bling’ you wore, they will however, remember the experiences they shared with you. So, find a group of people that you know you will have a great time with … and do something adventurous, planned or unplanned, just go outside and have a great time. Make your life what you want it to be.

Live life don’t just exist.  

$Money$

What does it mean to have lots of money? Happiness? Success? How do we view money? I fear that people have forgotten the value of other things in life, and have made everything about what is in their bank accounts. It is hard to live in this world without worrying about money, because money is so essential for our well being. Some young people only worry about how they are going to make more money, but they do not worry so much about how they are going to keep their family together, how they can become a better person, or how they can be happy.

We talked about appreciating the people around us in our post about family, you should value those who love you. If you are working too much and finding that you are not valuing the people around you, you have to stop and think if it is worth it. I have watched the families of those who work too much fall apart simply because they do not make time between their job and family. Is all of that money worth it if you do not have anyone to spend it with?

I feel that everyone’s financial goals should be to live comfortably, so that their families never have a “need.” Living in poverty can lead to unnecessary stress, and a whole number of things that I will not get into (that’s a whole ‘nother post), and having too much money can (but not always) lead to greed. The question is, will you ever have enough money? Then the question becomes, why should I stop making money? A few weeks back there was a person that was going around San Francisco, leaving envelopes of cash, and leaving clues on twitter. You don't believe me? Well check out this article from the Huffington Post. This one person started a nationwide trend, people have begun to do the same thing in different cities around the U.S. These “random acts of kindness,” as the media is calling it, has gotten a lot of attention because who does not like free money? (if you hate it comment below and tell me about your issues with free money) This one person in SF has so much money that they had no clue what to do with it, so they are just giving it away. Perhaps this person in SF got to a point where he/she realized that all of the money they had was not making them happy, so why not give it to people who could use it? (or some great media stunt … we will never know!)

I’m not trying to say that money is bad, I am saying that it is important to not let it control your life. There are many more important things in our lives like being a happy person. We also talked about doing whatever makes you happy in our graduation post, you can read about it here. If you are letting money control your life, then it will be difficult to be in the state of happiness; you are living for your money and you stop living for yourself. If you are not happy now what is the point? We are all going to die one day soon, and we cannot take any of our worldly possessions with us and that includes money (unless you are an Ancient Egyptian Pharaoh, and if you are comment below, I would love to hear about your rise from the dead!).

With all this swimming in my head, I have been facing the question of what job will be fulfilling to me in the long run. I will be satisfied when I know that I am helping people and making a difference in the world. I do not want to be tied down to a regular 9-5 job, where I am only there for the moollah. I want to live a comfortable life, but not at the expense of my happiness and the happiness of those around me. Take time out and think about what makes you happy, other than money, and make THAT your priority. In doing this you can ensure that money is not controlling you.

~Ta Ta

Forgive but NEVER Forget

A few years back I was having a conversation with a friend about the popular phrase “forgive and forget.” She was telling me that she never forgives nor forgets, and I was arguing that you should forgive, but do not forget. I think that no matter the situation, if it is big or small, forgive. My reasoning is a purely selfish one, forgive for your own peace of mind. When it comes to forgetting, don’t, file the incident in the back of your mind.

At the end of the day what really matters is how you feel about yourself. So, if you are busy being mad at someone else, how do you think that will affect your well being? Life is short so why waste your precious time being upset at someone else, just forgive them and move on. Buddha once said, “Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.” By not forgiving someone else you are holding on to something that will only hurt you in the end, if you do not get hurt physically it may be mentally. As for the other person, all you can do is hope they have learned their lesson, you cannot control how how other people think.

Never forget. If this person has wronged you, you do not want to make this mistake 2 times, by allowing them to hurt you. Some will say that you are not truly over an incident until you have forgotten, but I am here to say is not true. Going back to my post on Trust , I say that because this person betrayed me I now know that I cannot trust them in the same way again. I have made peace with what happened, it is no longer bothering me, it’s water under the bridge as they say. However If I forget that this person betrayed my trust, it will only happen again. When someone does something that causes you to rethink your relationship with them, it is hard to bounce back and act as though nothing has happened. With that being said, people do change and learn from their mistakes, it is not right to hold something against someone that happened along time ago. With time comes experience, and as we all get older we learn from our mistakes. Give the other person the benefit of the doubt, because you cannot truly forgive someone unless you can move past the situation.

Another thing that people do not do often enough is forgive themselves. The fact of the matter is that you cannot change the past. Life is SHORT! (Check out my other post in Dying) If you cannot change what happened, deal with it,learn from it and move on. If you need to say you're sorry say it and go back to living your life. You cannot put things on hold, time does not stand still for anyone. Do you want to spend your life holding a grudge? I have never met a single person on this planet who did not want to be happy, so get over it and be happy … and yes it IS that simple. We are only as happy as we allow ourselves to be. SOOOO forgive the asshole (even if that asshole happens to be YOU) and move on!

~Live, Learn. Move on.

We are All Going to DIE.

If there is one thing in life that is a guarantee it is death. No one knows what is going to happen after we are born, the promise of tomorrow is a lie. We all know that one day, it may be sooner or later, but we will all die. It doesn't matter when or how we die or where we end up afterward, what really matters is how we live and how we live is the only thing in our control.

I heard this analogy once that compared our life to a book.The two things that we know about a  book before we even read it, is that the book has a beginning and an ending, similar to our lives we only know about birth and death, but we don't know the story. My question is why do we fear death? We already know that it is a sure thing, we will all die one day, so why waste our time fearing something that we cannot escape?

Our days are numbered. We need to live our lives so that we never take anything for granted. There is no time for emotions such as; regret, anger, fear, jealousy, etc. focus on the positive, and be happy. I realize that this is easier said than done, but when you find yourself in a compromising position, just think about who you want to be and how you want to live your life. There is NO reason why you should be unhappy. Pick up that book you have always wanted to read, go workout, stop putting things off. Life is short, focus your energy on something positive.