The Thing About Experiences

You never know what your experiences will teach you and which one will change you. It may seem small at the time but maybe it becomes large in your life. It may be the first time someone compliments something you’ve done. It could be something you did not think about it at all. Writing has made me notice how much I’ve had the blessings to learn in my life. How rich the tapestry of influence and paying attention has yielded me. My experiences bleed into my writing.

Experiences in observational learning. Seeing the struggles and victories of others can teach you as much as going through it yourself. Perhaps, it can teach you more as being detached it could allow you a more objective perspective on the causality of the situation. How someone’s decisions affect the outcomes in life. If you are capable of empathetically walking in their shoes you could even begin to understand the choices made and the emotional toll they effect.

If you’re capable of observational learning, it’s through empathy. If you’ve learned empathy, you can step back and look at yourself through the eyes of others. You can understand yourself through a more objective lens. Experiences in your own life teach you so much on so many levels. Your failures can be tools to understanding who you are. What are you character flaws and strengths? Life will teach you this if you choose to be honest with yourself. I know I am deeply flawed, I have seen this for years.

In honest appraisal, it’s our flaws more than our strengths that determine our outcomes. Its was makes us interesting and human. It gives us depth. It’s why people love Batman more than Superman. Batman is deeply disturbed and Superman is, well, just super. It’s these experiences that make us interesting, well-rounded individuals. When we apply this to our writing and make balanced characters with strengths and weakness and use the internal friction this causes we make more than characters. We make them real. We make them identifiable.