I am a student of life: I know and feel the truth that there is always much to learn in life every day. To me, life is always presenting the opportunity to learn – as it challenges and inspires me constantly, in every moment.

Being a student of life means that every day I have the choice as to how I live and move within my life. I know within my deepest heart that I am the master of my life and how I choose to live it… I can feel the many opportunities that present for me to grow and deepen my ability to be myself in full. For instance, there are many behaviours that I have taken on over time that really don’t support me – in fact I can clearly see that these behaviours really don’t support anyone else around me either. Like getting angry and reacting to things in life I get triggered by because I’m not seeing what’s really going on in situations, by choosing to withdraw from life when I am confronted by the intensity of things I don’t think I can face (or don’t want to), allowing abusive thoughts to dictate my life or not listening to what my body is telling me it needs – such as not moving in a way that supports it, or eating foods it tells me don’t nourish it.

I’ve noticed lately that when I’m breathing in a really controlled, stuffy, shallow way I can’t feel my body and instead I stay stuck in my head, distracted by my thoughts. Once I notice this I realise that I can take full stock of the fact that I can breathe, open my chest and feel my whole body with a very real connection to and appreciation of this precious vehicle that carries me through my day. The importance of being a student of life, I have realised, is the enormous responsibility I have in my everyday choices in how I live this life, and how it affects myself and others in either a harming or healing way.

The teachings of Universal Medicine have offered me a chance to really have a look at how I live, and how we live as a society. It’s my choices every day that are the living open book I am writing of my life and the others I share life with… I now realise that how I live profoundly affects not only me, but others around me as well. We are not living as isolated beings from each other as we may wish to believe. It is an illusion to see it any other way. Each of us are intrinsically, simply together on this planet – sharing this space in us and around us.

I now consider every day as an opportunity to take stock and actually look at what is going on in my life so that I can bring more of myself to the world and this has allowed me to begin to heal that which does not and could never work for me or others. This also in turn inspires another to be themselves in the very same way – instead of being ‘victims’ of life – being on the backfoot of life. This is evident in how many of us live; with the increase in illnesses and disease we currently have: the mental, emotional and physical disharmony, due to accepting a lesser state than the truly loving divine and joyful beings we are.

I deeply appreciate the opportunity I now give myself to be on the front foot with life. To live and be open to seeing the things that are there every day – although they at times may be very challenging – as opportunities to learn and grow. In being a student of life, I am developing more truthful and loving relationships, healing behaviours that no longer support me or others, and accepting that it is my responsibility to live in such a way.

By Carmen Iredale, Home Cleaner, Swimming Teacher, lover of people and being the love that I am, NSW 

Further Reading:
Tools for Life
The classroom of life
Reaction versus response