Every Version of You Was Working With What It Had
Now that I’ve been seeing, literally on repeat, more posts, comments, thought bubbles on this, I’m more locked in and convinced I’m on a solid path where I need to stay honed on understanding behaviors and patterns not just in myself but in others.
You know, like, and I’m sure there’s a name for this theory, when you love the look of a particular silver car, then all of a sudden, you see that very car like everywhere, multiple times. And not in that stalking way where every internet-tracking, nosy algorithm suddenly decides that’s all you’re interested in, now pops it up, on any site you happen to go to, convincing you that you need to buy it now. That, I bloody hate.
So, getting back to the good version, I’m really digging this feel-right exploration that the universe is hell-bent on sending my way. It feels right, yes, but always good? No. Yet, I can’t remain blind to the obvious lesson it’s been struggling to teach me.
The Lesson: Every Version of You Was Doing Its Job
And I mean learning and accepting the lesson, not the hardship. Not the devastating life-changing (read: life-fucking) situation or circumstance that we’ll never ever fully heal from. Losing a loved one will never ever be a lesson.
I’m speaking of the stuff from our past, maybe still lingering in our present, that we still insist on bashing ourselves over. So for example, when past foolery that we participated in, ones we didn’t see coming, to the ones we clearly came to see, yet remained fully committed to… cue the incoming self-bashing. And the “If you knew better, you’d do better” spiel doesn’t always cut it.
So you could have knocked me over with a feather when a post floated my way. Someone mentioned, with full clarity and no wavering, that Every Version of You Was Doing Its Job.
Every decision, every life choice, you made… right, wrong, indifferent, hard-headed even, was not only done for a particular purpose, but looking back now, was there for a reason. And don’t flip off the internal rants of, “Oh my God, I was so bloody stupid,” or, “Why did I do that, shit?” It’s done. You can’t get it back, undo, or redo it. Time, money, and sanity have been spent. Instead, we need to look at it, and understand how it shaped us.
The Versions Of Me I Used To Criticize
For me, I’m choosing to see that the person I am today, and am continuing to work on, makes better choices now literally because of the messed-up ones I made before. Cause and effect… or as I’m now rolling with … “Cos dummy, look at the effect!” Most of us here on Planet Earth have not led an easy-going, skipping through a meadow kind of life. So then weren’t we kind of predetermined to make some of those effed up moves? Maybe?
Could that, in some twisted way, have been part of our life’s make-up. Oh, this is getting weird and a little dark.
Who says if we’d chosen to walk through door C instead of door F, that door C didn’t have a different version of crap we’d have to deal with. That’s just it… we don’t know. Then this version of us might be just teaching us a different lesson.
Without those “experiences”, I wouldn’t recognize healthier options, choices, relationships, today, as quickly. I wouldn’t trust my instincts the way I do today. Not when there was the me who stayed in situations far longer than I should have. The me who trusted people who hadn’t earned it. The me who didn’t fully trust myself. In my Big Age, the “bolder” I get, the more I realize, man, this level of thinking would have saved my younger self a hellova lot of stress.
And if time ships were real, and you could go back and not buy that thing that messed up your finances for years. Just because you didn’t commit to that one thing doesn’t mean it wouldn’t have been swapped out for something else, just as dumb… or worse! What if the lesson was “Remember, when I bought that overpriced car that I just had to have, that almost ruined me…”, that pain, laser focused in your brain, helped to prevent other dumb choices you may have come close to making. Maybe?
Wisdom is what gives us that lived-data we need to change—IreneB
Because how do you get stronger without acknowledging you were weak? How do you plan for better without understanding how to make wiser decisions? How do you become and keep growing into a more well-rounded version of you without having suffered and come out of some shit?
I’ll say it… I don’t think you can.
Some of that shit was light, and some of it is was unbelievably heavy. But maybe, that version of us was there with that lesson to move us forward. Away from even more shit we weren’t aware of and eventually into a different space. Unfortunately, wisdom usually shows its arse well after we’ve made all the mistakes, and are finally ready to commit to the “Well…I’m not doing that shit again,” mindset.
Reframing The Versions We Survived
So what if we now accept, willingly or begrudgingly, that every version of you is there for a reason. We live with the gut punches of our choices, but figure out how we can reframe it. Then every three to five business days, it doesn’t always have to feel like we’re dry-swallowing that recalled bitter pill.
Change will never be easy, but taking steps to not look back at your former self with only embarrassment anymore, but with more compassion has to be the way to go.
We did the best we knew to do at the time and/or we made the dumbest of dumb-diddly-decisions. But either way, done is done.
But it ain’t over ‘till it’s over. Keep going, babe. Wiser, stronger, terrified, even. Because you still get to become the ‘you’ you’re still growing into, and that version of you still has even more to teach you.
And I think that’s worth smiling about.
