When I think back on my childhood memories, I can't remember anything before the age of five. I don't remember learning to walk, talk, or eat. I mean think about it, do you remember taking your first steps? Do you recall saying your first word? Or what your first taste of food was? It's bizarre to me that so many of these "monumental" steps during childhood years, are just accomplishments that I'm told about, but have no recollection of.
In the next few years of life, we learn about human connection. These are the years of many "firsts." Your first best friend, your first relationship, your first fight, and your first loss. Often our first best friends are overlooked. This friendship usually occurs at such a young age that the majority of the memories are of playing games together or chasing each other on a playground. But the friendship teaches us how to interact with another person. My first "relationship" was in second grade, this taught me compassion for another person. The last thing I wanted to do as an eight-year-old was to go out and buy some boy who asked me out, chocolate for Valentines Day. But I was still dragged to the store to pick out a box so that the gift was "from the heart."
The first fight with anyone is always the worst. The first real fight I had was in sixth grade when I hung out with another girl instead of my best friend. My first loss, occurred when I was in third grade. My mom's dad who we called Papa passed away from lung cancer.
Looking back over the years I now realize how important my first friendship was. With this person, I learned how to interact with other people. I learned that I can't always get my way, sometimes you have to share the Barbie doll.
My first relationship taught me more than just to buy presents for Valentines Day. At an early stage of second grade, it taught me to care for someone else. I had to make time ( once every few weeks) for someone else and actually communicate with them. We only ever went bowling and to Chuck E. Cheese, but I still believe that that relationship laid down the fundamentals of what goes into a relationship.
I was in the wrong during my first fight, I ditched someone who made time for me to hang out with someone who I barely knew. I really didn't understand how I was in the wrong back then, because I wanted to hang out with a new friend and didn't see any issue. Once texts were sent to me saying that I wasn't a true friend, I thought the best thing to do would be to have my mom call her parents and fix it. Which is exactly what happened. I have realized that you must fight your own battles. Issues should be resolved by you, not your parents. I should've taken responsibility and solved it myself.
There is no good age to lose someone. I lost my Papa when I was a child. He lived with us for as long as I can remember. It honestly felt as if I lost a parent. This man was my favorite soul on this earth. We were two peas in a pod. I was always by his side.
When we are told about all our accomplishments in life, rarely ever mentioned are our failures. How many times did I fall before learning to walk? For whatever the reason we dismiss the struggle that it took to achieve, simply because we have achieved the goal. Over the past 18 years, I have learned that people don't share their struggles easily, but they exist. How many words did you attempt to say, but they came out as gibberish? In life, we can not achieve without failure, and that's okay. The key to success is to never give up. How long did it take you to eat? This one sounds silly but really think about it. You didn't come out of the womb with a full set of teeth. It took time for your teeth to develop and for you to go through the baby food stages before you were allowed to try yogurt or mashed potatoes, but even then you might not have known what to do with it in your mouth.
Life is about trial and error. Things don't just randomly happen, people have to work for what they want.
The most four important things I have learned would have to be about friendships, relationships, fights, and loss. Friendship is what gets you through this journey called life. Out of the 7.2 billion people on this earth, a connection is formed between a few people. They say that once you graduate high school you find out who really cares about you, and from someone's who is now a high school graduate, I can vouch for that statement. In life, people will come and go, but true friends will always be by your side. Relationships are a part of life. Majority of people find one person to spend their life with. Relationships require work, you have to learn to care about someone as much as you care for yourself. But in life, it's important to feel loved and to find love.
Relationships don't just have to be for a partner, it can extend to your relationships with friends and family. Having a strong bond with anyone is imperative. Fighting is going to occur at some point in your life. The odds are it'll happen more than once. It is impossible to get along with every person on this earth. It is not important who you fight with, or even what you fight about, but what happens after the fight.
Being hostile and holding grudges does nothing. I used to be a professional, I would legitimately blank people for months after a fight, and then one day I realized how foolish I was. Losing people is one of the worst parts of life. To have a connection with someone and then they just disappear, hurts. But it makes me treasure the memories that I've made with that person, and appreciate the people that are in my life. There is no explanation as to why death is a thing, but you can't let death stop you from living.
I can't tell you why, when, or how I realized the beauty in life, but I did. Life is a mountain. We all start at the bottom and it's up to you if you make it to the top. The top of the mountain is being able to sit back one day and reflect on all the people you've met, all the happiness you've experienced, and the memories you've made.
In 18 years of life, I've learned that you can't accomplish anything without struggling. You have to fall in order to get back up. You have to realize what is important to you in life, take a moment and think about who or what you love, and make it known.
