My lack of tangible progress does not imply that I do not know my way forward. I do. Else it's even impossible to perceive (a lack of) progress. The end of each month just includes certain items that visualise my lack of progress. It's almost like preparing the monthly financial statements and looking at the Profit & Loss, cash flow statement, and the Balance Sheet. The main difference is that I'm discussing them with myself.
I used the analogy of a fisher man to a friend: the fish don't bite and the float of my fishing rod still shows that I'm fishing in rough water. Perhaps I'm using the wrong bait. I do change the bait now and then to test its effectiveness. Perhaps I'm fishing at the wrong location. To be entirely clear on this analogy: stop fishing would equal giving up hope. And I'm not doing that.
Remarkably, I couldn't find useful information on my favourite website PsychologyToday.com. Consequently, I'm a little bit in uncharted waters. Nevertheless, my friend made a valid remark: we are being tested each and every day. I agree with that view although we may not perceive it that way in practice.
Each and every day, we are being tested as temptation is all around us: dating a married person, not scanning grocery items at the cashier’s check out, lying to people in order to benefit, not offering time to people who may need it, and so on and so forth. Each and every day, we get a chance to be the person we (don't) want to be.
In general, people admire a person that lives up to his/her principles: Gandhi, Mandela, Martin Luther King. Nevertheless, people seldom like to be tested like their heroes were. Often it's like the famous Groucho Marx saying: “Those are my principles, and if you don't like them...well I have others.”
The feeling - and notion – of “being tested” also implies that you are the subject of a test which is being performed by someone / something else. It's not always easy to accept that you're not in control over your own destiny. Especially nowadays, where there is such an emphasis on individualism.
Accepting a “power” in our life (e.g., Allah, God, Universe, Yahweh), which is higher than ourselves, seems to conflict more and more with our strive for individualism. Even governments struggle with - and suffer from - this phenomenon. Government are no longer regarded as a (higher) power but merely as - more or less failing – political institutions.
Being tested each and every day is how character is built. Abraham Lincoln once said: “Character is like a tree and reputation is like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.” And let's not forget: the more slowly trees grow, the better is the quality of their wood. Fast growing trees – like willows – bend and break easily. Easy come, easy go.
It was difficult finding one quote that summarises all. Hence, I give two quotes today:
- Talents are best nurtured in solitude. Character is best formed in the stormy billows of the world. Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win. Mahatma Gandhi