It's Not About You by Joshua

It's Not About You by Joshua - September 2022 Scholarship Essay

We live in a world with many demands. We all want to pursue happiness and live meaningful lives, but what exactly does that look like? The achievements of thousands are published to the world. Media paints a billion pictures of what it means to be a good person and what it looks like to find fulfillment and joy in our lives. In a world of many opinions and a thousand best-practices, it can be hard to find pure truths that can lead to self-development and living the meaningful lives we all want to live. I’ve found one truth, one piece of advice, that I wish I had learned earlier in my life. The truth is that if you want to be who you need to be then you need to realize that this life isn’t about you. If you get over yourself and start focusing on others, your problems get smaller and you will then be able to do things only dreamed of before.
It seems like the weirdest most paradoxical truth ever. In order to become a better person and live a meaningful and successful life I have to forget myself? At a quick glance it might seem crazy, and I get that. The first time I heard this I thought the same thing. But as I followed and trusted, my life changed.
When I first started learning and hearing this counsel I was in the Dominican Republic volunteering to help individuals and communities to improve their lives. This was probably the most difficult time of my entire life. As volunteers we followed rigorous schedules and served in a very high-stress, fast-paced environment. We regularly lost power and water 3-4 days every week, something few of us from the United States had experienced before. There wasn’t much free time, and any free time we had was spent recuperating or preparing for the next appointments and parts of our day. Amidst all of this there were many reasons to focus on myself. I had a thousand reasons to complain, and felt like I was drowning in responsibilities and inadequacy. But I eventually realized that my happiest moments were those when I was thinking about someone we were visiting, or a new neighborhood we discovered the day before. I found more confidence, strength, hope, and energy when I thought of what words of encouragement I could give, or ways that I could help and be there for the other volunteers I worked with.
One day our leaders invited us to read a speech on this subject. This speech changed everything. It explained how focused we as humans are on ourselves. It’s always about getting what we want and getting it right now. The speaker explained how if we put that part of us away and start thinking about how we can “turn outwards to others in love and service”, our capacity to receive joy, peace, satisfaction, strength, development and success would increase beyond what we could imagine ourselves having. He pointed out how if we want this capacity we have to forget about ourselves. But we’re not gonna receive it if we are focusing on receiving it. He said that if we forget ourselves we’ll receive this capacity, but we won’t be focusing on it.
This speech went beyond a list of dos and don’ts or adding things to our to do lists. It gave us a simple guideline-Get over yourself. It’s not about you. Forget yourself and start turning outward towards others. So I started. Whenever I found myself focusing on my problems I would quickly acknowledge them and put them away and then would start thinking about those around me. At one point I ran into a small obstacle. I thought 'well how are we supposed to make personal goals and try to practice and get better at things? Wouldn’t society not be able to improve much if nobody focused on improving?' The answer was found as I thought deeper on the subject. I realized that I can set personal goals and I can practice and try to develop as a person. The difference would be my innermost motivations and desires. I might humbly seek more strength, development, patience, love, etc. but do so for the sake of being better able to turn outward and serve others. As I kept applying it my days were filled with much more joy. I was more excited and focused as I met with those in our community. My mind cleared up and I felt much healthier.
If I could go back and give one piece of advice to my past self, I would say to forget yourself and focus on others. If I had heard of this more or had all of this explained to me earlier it might have helped bring deeper meaning and more strength into my life a bit sooner. But the truth is I’m not sure I’d go back and do that if I had the chance. My experiences have all taught me and brought real substance to what I’ve learned. I wouldn’t trade them for anything. Yes, they were difficult, but because of them I’ll never forget those lessons. I’m excited to spend my life bringing this to the world and helping it see the capacity to love we can each develop, if we could just forget ourselves and get to work.