Every person you meet and each experience you have adds to the disentanglement of life's craziness!

The phrase "life is too short" gets thrown about continuously, even meaninglessly sometimes, but recently I've noticed how much truth it contains. It might be more appropriate to say that all of these phrases are so cliche, but so very real too. It takes some people a lot longer than others to grasp these valuable tokens of wisdom and we are all always learning more about how to live and cope with life's dramas, but we all get closer through everything we experience and learn a lot from the people we encounter.

There comes a time when you become better at distinguishing what matters and what doesn't. Who matters and who doesn't. What's worth wasting time worrying about and what doesn't need to be given the time of day. And there is a time when you realise how good you're getting at it, this weird and wonderful thing we call life. I know I'm still so young but I feel I've gained a better understanding recently, though I'm fully aware that I still have a heck of a lot to learn and probably always will.

Many lessons can be learnt through friends and family. Those close to me teach me so much every day and each year around this time, when we all begin to reflect upon things, I appreciate all of these people so much. I've always had friends of all different ages. I see people as people, it doesn't matter about age or anything of the sort which has resulted in me having a range of friendships that provide different versions of valuable advice. I think sometimes we take this for granted, how much you learn from people around you. Even enemies and strangers can teach you so much.

The younger people in my life teach me that I'm not the only one stressing about everything, working little ideas up in my head and blowing them way out of proportion, that it's OK to be single, that I'm weird and wacky but still loved, that I still have friends after my horrifically drunken escapades (usually equipped with embarrassing footage) and so much more. Those with more life experience teach me that things don't change, some people never grow up, some people will leave your life for various reasons and that's fine, that you still feel as young just with more knowledge and less stressing over the small stuff, that there are always bigger things to worry about and people in worse situations than yourself, and again, much much more. Even strangers have taught me that a smile can make such a difference, people are always willing to help, listening is such a wonderful gift we've been given that people need to do more of and that respect is key.

Events also certainly teach you a massive amount. My time spent at Uni is a perfect example of this. Alongside academic learning, I learnt how to cook and survive on my own, how to be completely comfortable in my company, how to be a better friend, that I'll always find my type of people, that it's OK to just be me, that there's always a reason to celebrate and an excuse to consume a large bottle of white. My months away travelling the world taught me again how many great people there are out there, that the world is a huge place, that although dangerous, and it is incredibly dangerous, our world is still so beautiful, how to navigate my way, about other cultures across the globe, that New Zealand is full of sheep, how to see the good in everything and an unlimited amount more.

Regardless of how cliche and repetitive all of them are, life becomes a lot more straight forward when you listen to these phrases that are plastered about daily and when you listen to advice from others. It also becomes a lot easier when you stop thinking so much about everything and just let it be. As you grow things just keep making more sense (or as much sense as they ever will), the reasoning behind some choices you made become clear and you can look back and see that the dots always join up.

One less cliche piece of advice I will leave you with is from my beloved Grandad and I read it in the last thing he ever wrote. He said 'all good things you do in the world for other people are rewarded. Perhaps you don't recognise the rewards because they do not come in material benefits. It might be a good feeling or the experience of just having a day when everything is going your way'. I think about this every single day and I find that it is so true. I've frequently experienced these types of rewards having done something good in my life and I just know that my Grandad is so right.

So listen to others, take the advice and be grateful for everybody and everything that brings it. It's all worthy and you'll gradually and slowly begin to understand this beautiful mess of our existence.

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