It didn't work out as I planned - How lucky I am.
On trusting life and having faith in yourself.
Reading time: 3min
My mom used to say, "If this didn't work out, it's because there's something better coming your way."
When I was younger—and more naive—I usually disregarded her attempt at comfort and allowed myself to be drawn into the despair of whatever didn't work out as I had planned or expected.
When I was younger, I used to believe that I could do anything I set my mind to. But not necessarily in a positive way—it was more like "the universe responds to me, and everything should work according to my wishes." There was definitely a pinch of arrogance in the mix. While sometimes empowering, this attitude often left me crying in a fetal position more than I'd like to admit—after all, the world doesn't revolve around me.
But growing up, and hopefully becoming more mature, I had to find better ways to cope with the disappointments of life. And what I realized—that my younger self couldn't—is that it was indeed such arrogance of mine to plan for my happiness.
We don’t know what we need to be happy
The universe is so complex, with endless variables and influences, and we only have access to a very tiny perspective of these variables—of what is in front of us and what our awareness allows us to see. And from this position, we decide that we know from all possibilities what is best for us.
Imagine, it's like trying to plan your entire life based on the view from a keyhole. With just a tiny glimpse of vision, you confidently decide, "This is all there is."
I'm a big believer in living with intention, what kind of life you want to live, what values you want to cultivate, and moving towards what matters to you. But here's the secret ingredient: you have to trust life to know what's the better way for you to get it.
Trusting life
When I look back at my life so far, I'm so thankful for all the things that didn't work out as I planned. Because it redirected me to paths that actually brought me what I was looking for.
All the romantic relationships that didn't work out, all the jobs I wanted whose doors were closed, and every single conflict and challenge I experienced were not only redirecting me but teaching me something I had to learn to be able to live the life I intended.
Trusting life is not a passive attitude. It's not "let it flow" while you're sitting on the sofa watching Netflix. It's like a couple's dance, where you're constantly iterating on the feedback that you get. When we don't iterate on the feedback, life keeps bringing us the same situations over and over again until we get the message and do something about it.
How to iterate on life
I'm currently reading a book called "Dealing with Moments of Crisis" from a friend who is a therapist. And I particularly like how she proposes we reflect on the challenging moments we face. She suggests that we ask "what?" instead of "why?"
"What is this for? What's the purpose? What does this want to teach me? Show me?" instead of "Why is this happening to me?".
Asking "why" puts us in the victim role of our lives, while asking "what" puts us in the lead of it.
"What is life asking of you right now?"
She also talks about a concept which I was familiar with but didn't know there was a name for it. It's called "unity consciousness." It suggests that everything we experience is a reflection of our own inner world, which means all our life experiences are projections of our inner conflicts. This concept is talk about by diverse spiritual traditions like Hinduism, Buddhism, and Vedanta, as well as deeply explored by renowned psychologists like Carl Jung.
Trusting life also reflects our ability to trust ourselves.
When we have our back, we believe that life will have our back. It won't abandon us because we don't abandon ourselves.
When we don't trust ourselves, life becomes trickier because we constantly rely on external factors (which seem disconnected from us) to support us. When things don't go according to plan, we feel helpless.
How we experience life is shaped by our inner state. Without self-reliance, life gets too scary. The smallest unforeseen event can shake us out of our center.
Self-trust is not what the younger version of myself thought it was: "I trust myself to achieve anything, no matter what it takes." Self-trust is our ability to trust that we will be fine no matter what happens.
Life is always by your side
The way we relate to life influences a lot of the experience we get from it.
If we think that life is always on our side, we're more likely to grow from the experiences we have.
If we think that life is against us, we're more likely to stay stuck in the face of the events that are presented to us.
I surely, at times, still cry in fetal position, but after I take the time to feel my feelings, I take a deep breath, and ask: "What is life asking of me right now?"
"If this didn't work out, it's because there's something better coming my way," I tell myself.
Have faith in yourself
Trusting life doesn’t mean we passively surrender to everything—it means we engage with life with a sense of faith in ourselves. It’s a balance between:
Taking action where we can
Releasing control where we can’t
Knowing we will be okay either way
I'd love to hear your thoughts and experiences on this.
How do you relate to life? And how has that been working out for you? I’ll be honoured to hear your story 💜
With Love,
Nat