Author • Ayoooodeji

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"Judgement comes from experience and great judgement comes from bad experience"  - Bob Packwood

Our experiences tend to shape our perception of life, either good or bad, and as humans, we've all had our fair share of good and bad experiences. However, the concept of good and bad is subjective, so inevitably, our idea of good and bad experiences would most certainly differ. I wouldn't be dwelling so much on the good today, but on the bad. It is for this reason that I've decided to compose this article, to explain what I think a bad experience is all about, and to show that a bad experience, in itself, may not be so bad after all.

When we talk about a bad experience, what tends to come to the mind of people is that we're talking about an experience that leaves you feeling sour or unpleasant at the end, but most times than not, a bad experience may not always leave you feeling sour or unpleasant at the end. In fact, you may be happy at the end of an experience, but there's a high possibility that that must have been a bad experience. I know that at this point, it looks like I'm overreaching, but trust me, I know what I'm saying, or I think I do.

A bad experience, or any experience whatsoever to me, is beyond what happens on the surface. It goes deeper than that, touching the very fabrics of  our soul, and it often brings to light the flaws with the human mind in deciphering between good and bad. I'm trying to consider the subject of a bad experience on a broader spectrum, and I hope that I am able to make adequate sense of it.

An experience that leaves you happy, but isn't good for you overall is a bad experience, in my opinion. Although, this seems controversial, it's the truth. A good experience stems from not how you feel after the experience, but in how beneficial such an experience is at the end of the day.

To further explain this, I'm going to be citing an example from 2017. It's quite obvious that psychoactive substances, when taken, often tend to cause temporary excitement, but in the long run, it's harmful. Let's take into consideration Arizona, popularly known as a psychoactive substance, which induces happiness. The first time I tried the substance, I was very happy, and on the surface, it seemed like a good experience. I mean, I was happy. There was no side effect, and I was excited. However, health wise and mentally, it wasn't a good experience. That's just one of many instances I can cite.

Going further in my analysis of a bad experience, I hereby at this point want to say that even a bad experience, in it's entirety, may not be bad for a person. I'm talking about this in terms of human growth and development. 

Bad experiences, bring about a better sense of judgement, and that in itself is good. Although, it's not always advisable to have bad experiences, as some could be fatal, but most times, bad experiences always result in a greater good.

To wrap up this article, I'm going to share a personal story of what I consider to be a bad experience.

August 12, 2017, I was fresh out of secondary school, and I was thrown into a whole new world. I was free to do whatever I wanted to do, and seeing as I'd been raised under what some would call a restrictive environment, there were a whole lot of things that I was ready to try. 

First on the list of things that I wanted to try was alcohol. I'd been raised up with the belief that consumption of alcohol was a sin, hence it was prohibited in my house. I think it was a bit of a rebellious era for me.

Mid-september, I eventually decided to start taking alcohol. It wasn't the wisest decision I ever made. The first time I tried to take alcohol, I got drunk and fell in a ditch. The other time I tried it, I threw up. I then realized at that point that taking alcohol was not only against my family's principles, it was also definitely not good for my health.

Second on the list of things I wanted to try was smoking. I did, and I regretted. On my first attempt at smoking, I was coughing non-stop. I knew there and then that I was never going to smoke again. These and a series of other I tried didn't end well, and it turned out to be a bad experience for me, albeit, in retrospective, they weren't in their entirety, a bad experience, as they helped shape my perception about certain things, and gave me a clearer sense of judgement regarding certain issues. For instance, I know not to take alcohol, and I am wise enough now not to smoke.

The summary of all I've been writing since is that in life, there are good and bad experiences, which shapes our perception of life and society, and as human beings, we experience a fair share of both. However, I feel that the mind is partial in the way it judges what is a good experience, and what is a bad experience. Invariably, we may tend to classify what should otherwise be a good experience, as a bad experience and vice versa. It is to this extent that I have decided to pen this article, to explain to us, on a broader spectrum, what the concept of a bad experience is. I initially intended for this to just be me sharing stories of bad experiences I've gone through in life, but I realized that you can't share stories of bad experience if you don't understand what a bad experience truly is. 

In conclusion, as we go ahead in life, we're not going to be able to avoid having bad experiences, however we should channel such experiences through positive channels, so that we become better for it.

"Judgement comes from experience, and great judgement comes from bad experience"

BAD EXPERIENCE

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