SMILES AND SETBACKS •//• Embracing Life's Unpredictability

There are many times, we as humans get disappointed, and there are times we plan so much, we picture it so perfectly but it eventually turns out to be a failure, these things are inevitable for any human, but since humans are different creatures filled with emotions, it can only differ how an individual reacts to failure.

A new year is always a year filled with happiness, and most time it is always the joy of a new beginning that fills us. It gives us the feeling of hope, hope for something new, hope for a change, and even hope for a new era. This hope in us makes us plan and write down our goals for the next 365 days.

I am always so excited when I write my goals, there is this feeling of enthusiasm and determination that makes me smile while writing them down, I mostly see myself achieving them but although, it is not always as I planned.

Planning something I love doing, I love to write my goals down and the realistic way to achieve them. This year is no different as I have planned my goals for the next 365 years with my regular smile.

For this year’s planning, I made sure I made it so realistic. I sectioned the year into three; that’s, four months per section and I planned accordingly to these sections. Also, I usually plan for my downs, because I have come to learn that life is full of ups and downs.

But, what if we are already halfway through 2024 and my plans didn’t go as expected, what then will be my reaction?

As I have said, as humans we all have emotions and feelings, to be honest, at first, I will be frustrated and feel downcast knowing fully well that 6 months of the year are gone without any achievements or fewer achievements.

I had a talk with a friend of mine about goals and everything in between, we talked about how our plans to achieve certain goals don't always go according to plans, but we just concluded that life can't be so perfect.

I will always say life is full of ups and downs and it can never be a bed of roses, this is to say that I always expect some disappointment alongside any planning but I can’t waste so much time beating myself about it, instead, I would go back to my plans and ponder on what exactly went wrong.

One thing I would do is check out my mistakes and learn from them, with that I can make other plans to implement the lessons from the past 6 months. We can’t definitely have a perfect plan, we can only learn to create a better plan.

Another thing I would do is to reflect on my actual goals, just because it is a goal doesn’t mean it is the right thing to do, sometimes our goals aren’t the right goal or perhaps it was not realistic. If my goal isn’t so realistic I will consider going for a more realistic goal and if it is, I will work better on the plan.