You will agree with me when I say that life is an amazing journey that is completely and thoroughly unpredictable and incredible too. It takes us through some of the most wonderful and extraordinary moments and experiences as well as sad and distressing ones. Just when you feel relaxed and complacent, the hell breaks lose and calamity strikes. Sometimes you discover things by serendipity and at times you don’t seem to find things even though these are right before your eyes. You save the best for last and still do not end up using them for yourself. You often achieve what you never thought was humanly possible for you and at times success thoroughly evades you in spite of putting in your best efforts and being fully prepared. Life could be anything but predictable. Does it not show the duality of our experiences in daily life? The more you try reading between the lines or try taming it or making it conform to your wishes, the more it seems intractable and less amenable to any such maneuvers.

Life is all about ups and downs just like a roller coaster ride. One moment you are at the pinnacle, the very next moment takes you to the nadir. What is certain is that there is a regular transition between the favorable and unfavorable times, good and bad experiences just like the change of seasons. It goes on to prove that nothing lasts forever. The bad moments come to an end with the onset of good ones and similarly, the good ones come to an end by the onset of bad ones. The moment you become arrogant or start taking things for granted, just then life dashes all your hopes and crashes your flight midway. At this moment you are forced to believe in the existence of some higher power that controls our life as well as our destiny, that which is omnipresent and all powerful. That which transcends any physical form or shape and lends support to the theory that all events and happenings in this universe are governed at someplace else that is much beyond our own revelation. This is why we wonder if life is akin to playing a game of cards, not all hands are equally good and worth playing. At times you wind up much early in the game while at others you are tempted to play till the end. At times you do exceedingly well by winning handsomely and at others you lose miserably.

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Just as light loses its way when darkness descends, it is quite inevitable that failure, disappointment and pessimistic thoughts will overwhelm us. Just as the change of seasons is not in our control, in similar manner, change of fortunes, luck and circumstances are also out of one’s control. On the contrary, we are governed by the Environment in which we live. Consequently, what we are today is the result of our circumstances that our environment throws at us. The best way to combat difficult circumstances is by changing our response according to the situation and trying to find peace and pleasure within the changed set of parameters. Rather than cribbing about the unfavorable conditions, we would do well to assess and evaluate the new environment and develop a strategy to strive for success. Most of us have a habit of crying over spilt milk and lost opportunities and fail to act and take advantage of the new milieu. What is important to understand is that one needs to keep the right attitude in life. Somewhere deep in our hearts we should keep the faith that happiness is just around the corner waiting to reach us. Do you really believe that Bad Times would prevail forever? All we need is to keep our patience to carry ourselves over the bad phase in life as patience is the only fuel that is capable of propelling us towards good phase in life. Just as dawn bursts out with full force dispelling deep darkness of the night, in similar manner abject failures give way to sweet successes eventually.

No two moments in life are the same. Even if you visit a particular place twice, your experiences on both the occasions will be different. You might have missed certain views, feelings, thoughts and experiences the first time you visited and discovered them only in your second or subsequent visit. This is why life has immense power to surprise and charm us perpetually. You might have been heartbroken, inconsolable or dejected on a particular day but all that is surely going to change the next day. Go to sleep with an unwavering hope that the next day is going to be the most beautiful day of your life like none other. 

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You do not have to wait to experience a miracle in your life, it happens all the time. Nature, for one, is a miracle in itself. It holds immense power to heal the world of all its maladies and vicious things. We seem to be totally oblivious to the biggest miracle that God has created and keep searching for succor, solace and relief elsewhere. No matter how bad we treat our nature and environment, these reestablish and heal themselves every single morning to welcome us with open arms. 

What is important is to keep a balanced approach in life. How not to get carried away in happy times, how not to lose one’s equanimity in bad times, how to conduct yourself in both these times are valuable lessons that we must learn in life. Dwelling upon these questions and successful pursuit of answers will keep us firmly rooted to the ground. No matter how strong the winds of destruction blow, we will always retain our character and personality. If we do not learn from the bad times, we would have missed the opportunity that God gave us to learn and without which we would be leading a life only to lose.