Passages-part 1
Dr. Mirskin
Seminar
Seminar
Passages-Part 1
As young people, the question "have I wasted my life?" doesn't always happen to cross our minds. We're very used to just going about our lives without thinking twice about the consequences of our actions. To put it bluntly, young people live in a bubble. In her book Passages, Gail Sheehy explores how we think about life and how, as we get older, we go about learning from changes and failures that take us by surprise.
When I first picked up this book a couple days ago, I predicted that it would be a boring read (hey, I'm not going to lie). I looked at the front cover and I said "oh great. Another book that is about history and is filled with excerpts from that time period". Because that's what Sheehy means by excerpts, right? Isn't a passage just an excerpt?? Well to my surprise, this book is not about excerpts at all. In this sense, the word passage is referring to an unpredictable change or event in an adult's life, making them more aware of the world around them, specifically concerning the aspect of time. Pretty long before writing this book, Gail Sheehy went through a very unexpected and traumatic experience. Sheehy was in Northern Ireland, writing for a newspaper when British Troops began shooting at the public. In her words, she had her brush with death. This made her reevaluate her life and she grew socially, and psychologically. This was one passage in her adult life, and how she dealt with her trauma was how her passage was created.
I always wonder how we would act if we created our passages carefully. I do not mean always proceeding with caution (proceeding with caution has its pros and cons, but I digress). I instead mean how we end up learning from our mistakes. For instance, I have certainly had my fare share of failures and events that have affected me--and ones that I am continuously learning from. But many people (including myself even) take certain "tests of life" for granted. I think I'm a pretty spiritual person, and I always feel like the universe puts obstacles in our way to see how we overcome those obstacles, if at all. We are always creating our own passages, and to me it is how we grow from the challenges we face that determines our passages.
When I first picked up this book a couple days ago, I predicted that it would be a boring read (hey, I'm not going to lie). I looked at the front cover and I said "oh great. Another book that is about history and is filled with excerpts from that time period". Because that's what Sheehy means by excerpts, right? Isn't a passage just an excerpt?? Well to my surprise, this book is not about excerpts at all. In this sense, the word passage is referring to an unpredictable change or event in an adult's life, making them more aware of the world around them, specifically concerning the aspect of time. Pretty long before writing this book, Gail Sheehy went through a very unexpected and traumatic experience. Sheehy was in Northern Ireland, writing for a newspaper when British Troops began shooting at the public. In her words, she had her brush with death. This made her reevaluate her life and she grew socially, and psychologically. This was one passage in her adult life, and how she dealt with her trauma was how her passage was created.
I always wonder how we would act if we created our passages carefully. I do not mean always proceeding with caution (proceeding with caution has its pros and cons, but I digress). I instead mean how we end up learning from our mistakes. For instance, I have certainly had my fare share of failures and events that have affected me--and ones that I am continuously learning from. But many people (including myself even) take certain "tests of life" for granted. I think I'm a pretty spiritual person, and I always feel like the universe puts obstacles in our way to see how we overcome those obstacles, if at all. We are always creating our own passages, and to me it is how we grow from the challenges we face that determines our passages.
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