Greetings!
When I was a teenager, A talk among girls about the criteria of an ideal husband had an impact on my view of relationships. Here is another experience that changed me. It happened in my early teens.
In the place I came from, we had different teachers teaching different subjects with one of the teachers as the head teacher of the class. There were 45 students in each class. The head teacher assigned the seats. Normally, the teacher assigned a boy sitting next to a girl. Every two to three months, the teacher reassigned the seats so that the students got to interact with different students during a school year.
One day, 6 or 7 of us (girls) happened to talk about the boys in the class. One girl talked about the boys she disliked. She hoped the teacher would not assign her to sit next to them. Others joined in. Each mentioned some names. When it was my turn, I thought for a while. I said, "I hope I will not sit next to X because he is too quiet. I don't want to sit next to Y. Though I don't really know him, he seems to be rude. I don't like Z. He is cocky." (Yes, I was judgmental.)
A couple of weeks later, the teacher reassigned our seats. I was surprised I had to sit next to X. He was quiet, but we did talk. We got along fine.
A couple of months later, the teacher assigned our seats again. As if the Divine played a joke on me, Y was assigned to sit next to me! After a couple of weeks, I realized he might act somewhat different from others, but he was not rude. It was his way of being, and I was wrong to judge him.
One day, he said he had heard I was the best in Chinese chess among girls. He told me he was the best among boys. He wanted to play a game of Chinese chess with me. I did not know who said that to him. Girls seldom played Chinese chess. I might have won some games, but I was not good in Chinese chess. At home, I lost to my older brother all the time. I refused to play Chinese chess with Y.
For days, he persisted. He said he won all the time playing Chinese chess, but had not played any match with girls. Since he heard I was good in Chinese chess, he really wanted to have a match with me. Finally, I said, "I am not good in Chinese chess. Since you insist, I will play one game with you. Win or lose, I will only play one game. You have to promise me that you will not ask for a rematch." He promised. When class was over, we stayed to play a game. The game did not last long. I felt sorry looking at the expression on his face. (I truly did.) He kept his promise. He did not ask for a rematch. He was back to himself the next day. We respected each other.
When it was time to reassign our seats, I thought there was no way the teacher would assign Z and I to sit together. The last two times happened by chance, I thought. It did not happen to other girls in the talk. A few of us (incl. me) had laughed about the coincidence. Did it happen again? It did. Through our interaction, I found out Z was not cocky as I had thought.
At the time, I did not know anything about the higher self, angels, or guides. In retrospect, the experience could be a lesson of judgment brought about by the Divine (angels, guides, higher self...). This unthinkable coincidence made me realized that I was wrong to judge others. Everybody had one's own way of being. I should not use my measures to judge others, but accept them as they were. I learned it took time to know another person. With understanding, most of us could be friends. I decided to treat others with acceptance and respect as I did with my classmates.
Many Blessings,
Q of D
P.S. As a mother, I observe the difference between the Chinese culture and the American culture. Here in America, children talk about boyfriend and girlfriend at an early age. In my time, we went to school to learn. Boys and girls talked in class. However, girls normally hung out with girls during breaks, and so were boys. In higher grades in secondary school, only a very few might be seen as boyfriend and girlfriend.
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