“It was not curiosity that killed the goose who laid the golden egg, but an insatiable greed that devoured common sense.”
― E.A. Bucchianeri, Brushstrokes of a Gadfly,

Many lessons transpire over the course of one’s lifetime.

Experience increases with each passing second, each passing day. But, it is a cold hard truth that some people just don’t easily learn from experience. Some must experience over and over the same situation in multiple forms before they understand what they’re doing wrong, or what they’re not learning.

It is said that within the laws of Karma dwells a certain rule-book of sorts. One of these rules elicits the fact that one may repeat the same cycle over and over again until the lesson has been learned. And only then may he move onward, toward the next lesson.

This might be understood as karmic evolution, or otherwise, finally getting the fucking clue.

All of us go through a cyclic phase from time to time. We come into situations and experiences that trap us into cyclic behavior. We get stuck, and sometimes it takes years to become “unstuck.”

We stay in relationships for all the wrong reasons and the same problems keep repeating themselves. We stay at jobs for safety and security but we sacrifice our own peace, and again the same haunting thoughts and situations continue to show themselves. We may be trying to succeed at a venture but we keep trying to do it in all the same ways we failed before, only to realize that we’ve fallen into a cycle of failure, one that bears no fruit of learning.

No matter the situation, a situation that continuously repeats itself often to our own annoyance is one that needs to be dealt with. Some of us though, if we’re not wise to the world, will repeat these patterns over and over again until we finally get it right and are able to move on.

Personally, I’ve had my share of cyclic and sometimes seemingly hopeless patterns, some of which I thought would never change. But this was often brought on by my own stubbornness. They came mostly out of convenience or of selfish pursuits as I look back, and they only changed when I finally decided to change; when I finally got a fucking clue.

I truly believe that all of us have an internal gnosis of when we are being stubborn, or when we are simply not moving forward due to our own lack of wherewithal.

Sometimes, life has to beat you in the head with a hammer before you finally get the picture. When a subtle nudge no longer works, be sure a hard situation will fall right on your path; compliments of life.

But this is only for the greater good.

And sometimes, you have to be your own hammer.

These experiences exist for our growth, and for our own retribution; which the latter is often needed in some cases for our own karma to be exonerated.

During these long stretches of painful growth; within the doldrums of life, many of us might fall into that trap of self-serving, self-pity. We blame the world for our problems and never once look in the mirror or to our own devices as the cause of the problem entirely. And until we rise above our own egos and take responsibility for our own lives, we will never break the cycle.

And we will never move on, never learning a single lesson.

It is our duty to recognize these patterns of painful growth and remedy them. Though it may take some longer than others, faulting one for not seeing the forest for the trees is not our responsibility and not our judgement to make.

It is only by our own hearts and hands do we move forward in this life.

Recognize your cycles. Understand your lessons and don’t berate yourself for having fallen into them. But you must recognize that you found these situations for a reason; for your own good and for your own personal growth. It is only through this acknowledgement that we may unlock the door of experience and move on to greater things.

So, be gentle with yourself.

But, know when you need to kick your own ass a little.

Trust me… You’ll thank me later.