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The Single Most Life-Changing, Positive Lesson I’ve Learned In Life

Nicolas Cole
3 min readNov 30, 2020
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I was sitting in the middle of the forest with nothing but a tent, a small bag of fruits and nuts, a shovel, and a roll of toilet paper.

Each of us was given a space in this forest to spend 3 days by ourselves.

It was the afternoon, and for miles all I could see were trees and trees. There were no sounds other than the crackling of leaves under my shoes when I would pace my space back and forth. Every once in a while, I would test the silence and let out a scream, wanting to see how long it would echo.

“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

It carried into the distance for a moment and then faded.

Just like many of my thoughts of home.

I had arrived on this trip with a lot of anger. I was 19 years old, feeling all the things you feel when you’re 19. I felt like my parents didn’t understand me. I felt like everything I did was wrong. I felt like no matter how hard I tried, I would never be the person they wanted me to be. I felt lost and didn’t know what I wanted to be in life. I enjoyed music. I enjoyed writing. But other than that, I didn’t enjoy much else. Most days, I just felt stuck.

But that day in the forest…

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Nicolas Cole
Nicolas Cole

Written by Nicolas Cole

100M+ Views | 5x Author | Co-founder of Ship 30 for 30 | Want to start writing online? Get the Ultimate Guide: https://startwritingonline.com

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