— LIEUTENANT TUVOK. LEARNING CURVE. 48846.5

The very same message appears in a thousand forms throughout the galaxy, and dozens on any single planet.

For example: “History repeats itself for those who fail to learn its lessons.” Or: “Even the victor must fight again if he learns not the cause of the war.” Or, on a more mundane level: “Unless the divorce leads to self-knowledge, the suitor will marry the same spouse again.”

Terra is only one of many planets on which entire religions have grown up around the idea that life’s purpose is about learning from our mistakes—and that we will learn, even if it takes a thousand lifetimes to do it!

On the other hand, being “doomed” to repeat our mistakes is perhaps too harsh a sentence. We could just as easily look at it in a hopeful light: That the Universe is giving us another chance to learn a life-changing lesson; and we wouldn’t want to “graduate” until we did.

What’s even more hopeful is that The Universe provides new opportunities for learning our lessons every day. All we must do is seize them, to try something new this time, and keep trying until we discover what works.

In fact, it’s the learning of this “experimental” attitude that is one of life’s most important lessons!

Mistakes represent failed experiments. I will take advantage of any new opportunities The Universe gives me to try again, and finally learn its lessons.

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The above meditation is taken from Going Boldly on Your Inner Voyage © 1999-2004, IF Books.

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