Every situation has a silver lining – discover a mindset that heals and enlightens.
November 6, 2021 · 7 min read
If you’re serious about changing your life, you’ll find a way. If you’re not, you’ll find an excuse. ~ Jen Sincero
Have you ever been incredibly shocked by your past events?
Have they left a scar? Or perhaps they’ve changed your view to life?
Eye opening experiences leave us stunned and make us rethink our point of view. It’s not a surprise that some of these experiences leave a seed of negativity in our minds. They open a new perspective that we haven’t thought of before.
All in all, it’s all up to your mind whether you view eye opening moments as negative or positive experiences. If you tend to be more positive, you’ll definitely see these experiences as lessons what you should avoid or how to handle the situation better the next time.
What is an eye opening experience?
An eye opening experience is an unusual encounter which makes you rethink how you view a situation from now on. It teaches you new insights about life.
Traumas and eye opening experiences both have correlations. About 75 percent of people will experience a trauma at least once in their lives.
Though, an eye opening moment can be experienced in a simpler manner, such as being an observer. You don’t necessarily need to experience it yourself.
8 Signs you’ve experienced an eye opening experience
Here are 8 signs which you might relate to some of them if you’ve experienced an eye opening experience:
- You’ve experienced a trauma.
- You felt/feel numb.
- You are in awe.
- Your perspective on world has changed.
- You question the reality.
- You feel exceptionally sad/happy/angry.
- You feel as if life has crumbled.
- You feel grateful for what you have.
In what ways can you encounter an eye opening experience?
There can be several ways of experiencing eye opening moments. This can be done through:
- Learning. For example, medical students have to go through a lot of violent graphical photos/sources to understand the consequences of particular life events.
- Observation. Imagine you’ve just seen a huge car crash in front of your eyes which didn’t harm you physically in any way.
- Experiencing yourself. You’ve gone yourself through an event that shocked you.
12 Ways Eye Opening Experiences Change You For Better
1. You appreciate life more
If an experience opened your eyes, you will become more grateful for what you have. It will make you more energized and value life more.
Gratitude has also positive benefits towards wellbeing and mental health. It can make a huge difference how you feel from day to day.
While you might’ve not appreciated some things in the past, now you are appreciating them more. Simple, yet crucially important aspects of our life become a life present, such as ability to walk, see, smell, talk with people, having good health, etc.
As a bonus, you become more optimistic, because you feel more grateful towards what you have. You unconsciously train your mindset and it becomes more efficient at life.
2. You see the world through different eyes
Life changing events can make you adopt a different mindset than before.
The most important thing is becoming more mindful. You are aware that everything happens not because of a coincidence. The decisions of people lead to certain outcomes.
That’s why you don’t have fear of missing out because you are aware that you can create everything on your own.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people. ~ Eleanore Roosevelt
Whether these outcomes are bad or good, you are aware of it. Eventually you may notice that people don’t differ that much, really.
We all have our purpose in life and lead ourselves according to our moral values and goals. World has both positives and negatives, and the fact that you’re aware of it makes you see the world through different eyes.
3. You gain valuable experience
Especially if you’ve experienced an eye opening event yourself, you will acquire incredible experience that will always remind you of what not to do or do better.
I’ll take myself as an example. I had a father that showed no affection, used verbal and physical violence, was manipulative, lying human being.
I knew that this wasn’t the right fatherly figure to look upon. It hurt to see other children walking with their dads and having a fun time. I wished I could fill the void and have a proper dad.
This lifelong experience taught me incredibly valuable lessons what not to do and how much affection children need. While my childhood and adolescence were empty, at least I can make sure my children won’t have to go through the same.
4. You are the creator of your life
A strong source of personal strength comes from eye awakening experiences.
Try to guess who is responsible for your majority outcomes in life? You.
I can completely agree that there are some forces in life that we can’t control. It’s just not up to us. As individuals, we can’t erase the wars. We can’t tell the virus not to come into our body.
Step out of the history that is holding you back. Step into the new story you are willing to create. ~ Oprah Winfrey
However, we can control ourselves. We can reduce the risks that we don’t need as much as possible. We can increase the chances of our success as much as possible. Your mindset matters a lot when you’re creating your own life.
We can’t always blame the environment if something goes not as planned. Perhaps the plan wasn’t that good after all? Perhaps some more precision was needed to execute the plan correctly?
Our personal strength comes from experiences. Use them to your advantage.
5. You see yourself differently
Depending on your eye opening experience, you may change the way you see yourself.
People are absorbed in their own emotions, cognitions, and sensations. We see ourselves through our own subjective lens. In general, people tend to see themselves better than they actually are.
But, that doesn’t mean that now you have to be overly critic of yourself. It means that you see your imperfections and what you can improve on.
The fact is, we see ourselves differently than other people do. Life changing experiences can alter our opinion on that.
6. You value relationships more
If you’ve ever faced very negative, full of destructive criticism people, you know how uneasy it is to speak with them. The huge difference between two separate objects allows us to appreciate positive things better.
So, if you have a positive and supportive relationships with your significant other or your friends, you start appreciating them more. The bonds become stronger, you feel gratitude for people you love.
You start craving for more intimate and deeper relationships with your friends. Sharing similarities among you strengthens the relationships even more.
7. You gain awareness of new possibilities
Life changing experience opens eyes to new opportunities. You become more insightful what surrounds you and you leverage the experience to your advantage.
For example, your business is failing. You start feeling hopeless. You start to freak out and investigating what’s going wrong.
By changing nothing, nothing changes. ~ Tony Robbins
Eventually, you find out that a new competitor has come in and improved your product. You weren’t aware of a possibility that it can be enhanced. As a result, you try to outperform your competitor’s product and you finally succeed.
Now your business is stable once again and stronger than ever. So, stressful experiences can benefit you for the better.
8. There are no mistakes
As you gain more life experience, you understand that there are no mistakes. There are only lessons to be learnt that we need to master.
Without mistakes, people can’t improve themselves and become better versions of themselves. People that think differently are driven by ignorance and unwillingness to change. As a result, they have a fixed mindset and stay stagnant.
The biggest obstacle that a lot of people face is living in the past and fearing the future. That’s the mistake that they have to push through.
Mistakes are high dense nutrient food for our brains. We gain more awareness and invaluable experiences.
It’s easy to blame yourself for being stupid. But it’s even easier to be ignorant and not to take into account that life creates a lot of opportunities for you to improve.
9. Your attitude towards life determines your destiny
If you constantly think that you suck at everything, you surely will. When you finally start accomplishing something, you start valuing yourself and proving your self-worth.
Eye opening experiences can serve exactly for that purpose. For example, if you finally manage to lose weight or gain significant amount of muscle, you become more confident in yourself. Your attitude to life becomes more positive and you start believing your own strengths.
Sometimes you never realize the value of a moment until it becomes a memory. ~ Dr. Seuss
Oppositely, if you give up on yourself, your destiny will be less or more clear. You will live a compromised life and your attitude will lead you exactly to mediocrity.
That’s why the more you get inspired, the more you’re likely to steer your life wheel to the direction of big achievements. Simply by feeding your brain with life changing stories and successes of other people will help you to become a better person yourself.
10. Life is all about present moment
Fatalities and losses open eyes like nothing else. If you’ve experienced a tragedy yourself, you will understand what I’m talking about.
Life is incredibly fragile and precious. We mustn’t focus on past or the future. Life happens in the present moment. We have to live in the present moment and enjoy the environment and our loved ones.
The second important aspect why it’s important to live in the present is because of happiness. People focus too much on their goals and forget about the actual process. They believe that happiness comes from achieving goals. That couldn’t be further away from the truth.
When people finally accomplish their goals, they actually feel happiness but not for a very long time. It’s a temporary feeling. After that people set even higher goals and this cycle of hamster wheel never ends.
Don’t hesitate to stop whatever you do and surround yourself with the view you have outside, people around you, the smells, and everything else. Change the process and life strategies if they don’t satisfy you.
Enjoy the present.
11. What you resist, persists
This saying comes from Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung. The meaning of it is that you shouldn’t resist whatever you are resisting, because it only follows and haunts you more.
If you’ve ever managed to beat biggest fears, you will know what it means. It has opened your eyes wide enough for you to understand it.
Life is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but a comedy in a long-shot. ~ Charlie Chaplin
While resistance and persistence are on the opposite poles, they have a very close correlation. Have you heard a saying that differences attract each other? Like, different people get along very well together and fill each other’s imperfections?
Same principle applies right here also.
When you’re complaining about something, dedicating a lot of energy to resent and battle against the thought, you unconsciously grow the problem. You visualize how bad it is, you exaggerate it, and it only gets more stuck in your mind.
The moment you accept the problem, it stops persisting. The sooner you change your mindset, the faster you escape the unhappiness.
12. Your habits shape your personality
See, a lot of young people don’t understand that your character is the sum of your daily habits.
You simply can’t pull the switch in your mind that is called “I’ll change from this moment”. Your character development consists of daily activities and your perspective to life.
When you finally comprehend that, you will open your eyes and start thinking differently.
Here you can watch a very short video that is explained in a very practical way. In this scenario, students have experienced an eye opening moment and some of them might’ve been inspired to change.
Final Words From Delightful Mindset
Eye opening events are incredibly important part of our lives. They shape our character and in a sense force us to become better version of ourselves.
Nonetheless, eye opening experiences are worth nothing if you get shocked only once and you forget about them in the future. You have to consciously remind yourself why are you trying to change and what’s the purpose behind that.
The main key is mindfulness. Whatever you do, be aware of the consequences and the way you approach a situation. That determines your character development.