Understanding Concept of "Life Lessons"

[sat2493]

My purpose of this post is to understand more about life lessons more abstractly. I do not want to engage in mental masturbation in this topic. But I feel like this hasn't been talked about in this forum, and I have never spoken about anybody else about this topic explicitly. Only implicitly. The theme of this topic is that life is going to present to you the same problems over and over and over again, until you finally learn the lesson. My belief is that you could either accomplish this in multiple lifetimes or do it in this lifetime. I want to go over a personal background of how I reached this to clarify what exactly I mean.

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To give a background of how I reached this rabbithole, I have been learning how to program. The life lesson that presented itself to me over and over again, was not to cheat or plagiarize from code that already exists in the internet. I refused to see the lesson for what it was, and tried to shortcut my way around actually mentally thinking about the problem. You know how the lesson goes. In the short run, I saved so much time, and finished assignments and tasks quickly. But in the long run, I didn't fundamentally understand what it was I was coding. I learned absolutely nothing. I get confused on coding interviews. Surfing the internet reaches it's limits when your intention is to cheat.

Eventually I learn. I open my mind to see the lesson for what it is. I actually have to sit down and understand the coding concepts, and how to code, NOT how to copy code. Now all of a sudden, the structure of coding problems is more easy for me to discern. Referencing one of Leo's videos, I can now easily discern the content of coding problems from the structure of coding problems. I finally learned my lesson so now I can see beyond the lesson and the problem for what it is.

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So now my background aside, these are my questions.

What are some of the most fundamental lessons that one, or a conscious being, learns in life?

How does one take into account the uniqueness of their own lessons in life? For example, I know my lesson involving cheating was definitely meant for me, but it does not necessarily apply to all coders.

Are lessons just semantic? Is it even possible to have a conversation about lessons when every person has a subjective lesson they need to learn to understand concepts? (I already highly doubt this.)

How does learning life lessons relate to self-actualization?

[The_Alchemist]

Great questions and topic, I love the overall vibe, good for you for recognizing your flaw, short sightedness is basically all of our problems lmao; food/sex/drugs/dopamine/materialism....we trade pleasure now for pain later, when we should trade pain for pleasure later and we actually get to enjoy the pleasure unlike pleasure now (we dont enjoy because we feel shame and guilt) and then pain later (2x shame and guilt)

 

Most fundamental lessons tie back to mind/body/soul;

Learn something new everyday; books/lectures/mentors
Exercise; weights/running/yoga/mma
Help someone out; time/energy/emotions/knowledge/money
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Everyone has one recurring problem, this problem ties to desire (food/sex/drugs/dopamine), anger (something from nothing/want it all NOW!) or pride (I know everything, im the best, Im god)

They need to recognize this and take action because this problem has already caused massive heartache as it is

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Yes there are over 1000 mental models (less than 5k unless we get into massive distinctions) that are useful for a good life, 100 that are must knows. Its like particles in the universe, yes technically there are infinite variations, but they are all more or less the same:

Physicists have so far identified 57 species of elementary particles. In particular, the Standard Model contains quarks and leptons, grouped into three families that differ only in their masses.

We don't even have to use the 100 number, we can say there are 57 lessons you must learn, limiting the scope and tying lessons together is better. Most people basically learn nothing in their lives, but it's ok, everyone plays a role in history in some way.

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What's the alternative to learning?
Can you achieve anything great without learning/pain/reading/masters and being humble?

Learning=improvement
Learning=self reflection
Learning=humility

Learning is all God does (through us)

Edited December 4, 2020 by The_Alchemist

[Osaid]

18 hours ago, sat2493 said:

What are some of the most fundamental lessons that one, or a conscious being, learns in life?

For me, it is the concept of equivalent exchange. There is always a pay-off for things in life. You can cheat on a test, but what is the cost? What is the benefit of not cheating? Why is it possible that I can put in less work than other people and get a better mark by cheating? Where is the pay-off that allows this to happen? 

After a while you will start to see these equivalent pay-offs in pretty much all aspects of your life. 

Your coding problem was a pretty good example of this btw

18 hours ago, sat2493 said:

How does one take into account the uniqueness of their own lessons in life? For example, I know my lesson involving cheating was definitely meant for me, but it does not necessarily apply to all coders.

Your inner state will manifest itself physically. For example, a depressed person could become fat and infatuated with food as a by-product of their inner state, which is depression. And then, health problems and other such things will start to manifest and slowly become worse until they fix their state of mind. Once they fix their state of mind, their need for food and their obesity will also automatically fix themselves. It can also go the other way around, they can fix their need for food and their obesity and then that will also fix their mind in the process. The order doesn't really matter.

So, you could say the uniqueness is proportional to what their level of development is and what they are struggling with.

 

18 hours ago, sat2493 said:

Are lessons just semantic? Is it even possible to have a conversation about lessons when every person has a subjective lesson they need to learn to understand concepts?

It is basically just karma/equivalent exchange playing itself out. It's like the Universe putting a splinter in your thumb to wake you up and make you realize that you can improve yourself.

You can also have two different experiences which contain the same lesson, it doesn't have to be the exact same experience which teaches it.

 

Edited December 5, 2020 by Osaid

[Preety_India]

I'm currently learning that life itself is imaginary and illusory and reality keeps convincing us otherwise and it will take many years to beat reality and come to the same conclusion which is hidden most of the time as we go through life. 

 

[sat2493]

2 hours ago, Osaid said:

For me, it is the concept of equivalent exchange. There is always a pay-off for things in life. You can cheat on a test, but what is the cost? What is the benefit of not cheating? Why is it possible that I can put in less work than other people and get a better mark by cheating? Where is the pay-off that allows this to happen? 

After a while you will start to see these equivalent pay-offs in pretty much all aspects of your life. 

Your coding problem was a pretty good example of this btw

Your inner state will manifest itself physically. For example, a depressed person could become fat and infatuated with food as a by-product of their inner state, which is depression. And then, health problems and other such things will start to manifest and slowly become worse until they fix their state of mind. Once they fix their state of mind, their need for food and their obesity will also automatically fix themselves. It can also go the other way around, they can fix their need for food and their obesity and then that will also fix their mind in the process. The order doesn't really matter.

So, you could say the uniqueness is proportional to what their level of development is and what they are struggling with.

 

It is basically just karma/equivalent exchange playing itself out. It's like the Universe putting a splinter in your thumb to wake you up and make you realize that you can improve yourself.

You can also have two different experiences which contain the same lesson, it doesn't have to be the exact same experience which teaches it.

 

 

2 hours ago, Osaid said:

It is basically just karma/equivalent exchange playing itself out. It's like the Universe putting a splinter in your thumb to wake you up and make you realize that you can improve yourself.

You can also have two different experiences which contain the same lesson, it doesn't have to be the exact same experience which teaches it.

 

What is the difference between karma and equivalent exchange? They seem similar to me. My understanding of both of them also mixes them up with the concepts of "payback".

[Osaid]

29 minutes ago, sat2493 said:

What is the difference between karma and equivalent exchange?

I think they're both actually the same thing, but karma seems to be referring to a more specific form of equivalent exchange where it only focuses on the human aspect of it.

For example, if someone throws a ball into the air, you wouldn't normally call that karma even though it is an equivalent exchange of cause and effect. But, you might call it karma if the ball falls down and hits you in the head.

 

Edited December 5, 2020 by Osaid

[sat2493]

12 hours ago, Osaid said:

I think they're both actually the same thing, but karma seems to be referring to a more specific form of equivalent exchange where it only focuses on the human aspect of it.

For example, if someone throws a ball into the air, you wouldn't normally call that karma even though it is an equivalent exchange of cause and effect. But, you might call it karma if the ball falls down and hits you in the head.

 

I see. I don’t completely understand, but I think that’s okay. I would like to allow myself to see what you mean over time.