Live Life On Your Own Terms
Life is the most precious exceptional and mysterious entity we would come across. Life is similar for every living being in its meaning yet different in living. To understand how one can lead their life the way they want to, one needs to understand a little as to how humans think and behave.
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The vicious cycle behind human thinking
People tend to live their life under the influence of multiple factors. Major influencing factors are the factors that impact us directly as we lead our lives everyday. It can be our family, our community, our education, our knowledge, our exposure and so on. Each of these factors play a very crucial role in shaping up our thoughts, views and opinions about someone or something. Our thoughts and notions make us see someone or something, perceive it in whatever manner we deem fit. Once we have analyzed the thing, we finally respond, act or react to it in form of some action. The moment we act, we are judged and perceived by others the same way we perceived them at the first place and their judgement is again influenced by the factors that govern them.
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The Vicious Cycle Behind Human Thinking
Distinct Life Scenarios – “Life we live” and “Life we want to live”
What inspired me to dive deep into this topic and come up with my opinion on it is the fact that most of us experience two kinds of lives. One is the life we actually live and the other that we wish to live. Let us evaluate these two kinds of life scenarios to understand them better:
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The life we live
Most of us live life as per the rules, norms and perception of our society or culture we have grown up with. These norms or opinions are formed to help people adopt a certain way of living that is largely acceptable to society. The society and our culture impact and builds up our values and opinions without we even realizing how big the impact it has on us. The smallest things like the way we dress, the way we eat and drink, the way we interact with others, the way we think what is right and what is wrong, etc, all are influenced by the culture we come from. We follow them blindly because we do not want to portray ourselves as the odd one out. We succumb under the pressure of other’s judgements and bury deep down inside us the desire to think and do things differently, which our community thinks of as unacceptable. We get scared to raise our voice against the age old norms and traditions which our independent and forward thinking minds want us to throw away and not follow them. Simply put in one line, we are not able to live our lives the way we would want to but in a way that would please others.
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The life we wish to live
It is in human nature to desire and long for what we do not have in life. We tend to idolize and yearn more and more for living the kind of life which provides us with ample freedom and independence to live the way we want to and still not be judged by others. If we are limited or restricted by any of the factors in leading our dream life, we start building up a feeling of resentment and frustration within us.
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A Balance - The Key to a happy Life
According to me, if we want to live a happy and contented life, a balance between both the lives we live and the lives we wish to live needs to be achieved. We have to understand that we cannot change the world around us but the power to change our thinking and mindset, lies with us. And that is all we require to come closer to living the life we yearn for. To what extent we allow others to influence and shadow our personality and judgement depends entirely on us. We can control and limit the impact of the societal and external pressures by believing in ourselves, having a strong grit and determination to do what we want to do and eventually proving it to others to change their mindset and finally inspiring others to follow in our footsteps.
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By Aditi Mahajan
Content writer, poetess & a blogger
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Some inspiring Quotes
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“Change your thought and you change your world.” By Norman Vincent Peale
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“In the end, it is not the years in your life that counts. It is the life in your years.” Abraham Lincoln
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“Not how long but how well you have lived is the main thing.” Seneca
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“You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” Mahatma Gandhi
