Life Lessons That We Can Learn from Ants

There are so many life lessons to learn from ants. Do you know that despite its tiny body, ants are one of the strongest animals in the world? Male ants are able to carry loads weighing 50 times their own body weight. Also, ants never know the words give up and always look for ways to reach their goals.

By learning from ants, we know that we can learn from anything. We can learn lessons from the people we meet, the problems we face, and also nature creatures like ants. Below are the meaningful life lessons that we can learn from ants.

Be Passionate

When we are passionate about something, we should put a lot of effort into it. We should fight hard to get that something we want. Ants are willing to walk thousands of miles with their tiny feet to get food. Sometimes they even need to climb to get what they want. From this, we can learn that we should not give up getting what we want.

Also, having a passion will make our lives livelier. People will look alive when they have goals to reach in their life. With passions, people will look happy, especially when they are very passionate about it. So, find your passion. If you don't know what you want in life yet, don't stop exploring. One day, you'll find out your purpose in life.

Selfless and Willing to Sacrifice

It cannot be denied that humans have an ego. And having an ego is not something wrong, it makes us human. What makes it wrong is that when we let the ego takes us over, turning us into a selfish person. Selfish people don't have empathy for others. They only think about themselves and think that no one is more important than them.

On the other hand, ants are willing to sacrifice. They won't leave their friends behind when they are bringing food home. Ants always work together carrying food, showing that they are a selfless animal. If we are willing to learn this from ants, there will be more smiles in this world as everyone is willing to help each other.

Always Sharing

Even just a drop of honey, ants always share it with others. No matter how little food they got, ants will always enjoy it with their colony. This teaches us to always share with others, especially with the ones in needs. Ants are not a stingy animal; they always share anything with their colonies. When they manage to find something to eat, ants will always tell others that don't have food yet.

They do it by leaving a chemical trail along the path they walk. This trail will make it easier for other ants to track the food. As you can see, ants teach us to always share with others. Note that sharing is not always about food. We can also share other things, such as knowledge. By sharing others, we'll be happy and find life more meaningful.

Be Disciplined

You must have seen a row of ants walking, haven't you? There are hundreds of ants, and these tiny creatures form a line. And every ant has its own jobs. For example, worker ants have a duty of building their anthill, some other ants have a job to look for and collect food for the whole colony, the queen ant needs to guard the anthill, and so on.

It's as if every ant has its own job description and duty, and they are disciplined when carrying their jobs. Every ant gets the appropriate portion of job, and they do their jobs well. If we want to survive at work and have a better career, we need to learn this lesson of being disciplined from ants. As we all know, people love to work with a disciplined person who can do their job well.

Be Loving

Besides being one of the world's strongest animals, ants are also one of God's sweet creatures. When an ant meets another ant, they will greet each other with their antennas. This is actually the way they detect their colony and share food, which is called trophallaxis. Trophallaxis is like a process of how ants detect other ants if they are from the same colony or not.

This teaches us to always be loving with others, teaching us to be a friendly person to others. Don't doubt to greet someone we know if we bump each other. If you're an introvert or have poor social skills, at least make a smile when you meet someone you know. Train yourself to be a friendlier and more loving person. You don't have to change your personalities, but you should know how to place yourself in any situation.

Putting Others First

The next life lesson to learn from ants is putting others first. These tiny creatures never look for food only for themselves. They always find food for the whole colony. As it is said before, they always find food to eat together even just a drop of honey. Ants always put their colony's needs first over their personal needs.

It doesn't mean we always have to put others first before us. It's totally fine to occasionally prioritize yourself first so that people won't take benefits of you. But sometimes, there are some situations where we need to put ourselves aside and prioritize others. In this situation, we should be sensitive to prioritize others' needs first.

For example, you have a promise to hang out with your friends, but your mom asks your help to buy some medicines for her. In this case, you should prioritize your mom first and tell your friends that you might be a bit late.

Never Give Up

If you look carefully, ants always manage to find a way when they are facing an obstacle. When you block their ways, they will always look for another way to keep carrying their food. If you want a proof, try to put your finger in their path. Instead of stopping or going back, ants will try to find another way to get through your finger.

They will find another way or climb your finger. And in this life, everyone surely has their own challenges, whether it's about work, financial, education, romance, and others. Learning from ants, we shouldn't stay still or even give up on any obstacles that come our way. Because obstacles and challenges actually teach us how to be stronger.

When we face an obstacle, we should keep trying to find alternatives to get what we want and reach our goals.

Always Be Prepared

Have you ever heard a story about little ants and a grasshopper? During the summer, little ants are busy collecting food for the upcoming winter. On the other hand, the grasshopper is just having fun throughout the summer. The little ants know that summer won't be forever. Winter will come, in which it will be hard to get food.

So that when the winter comes, the little ants still survive while the grasshopper don't as it runs out of food. From this story, the ants teach us to always be prepared, especially for the worst. We shouldn't be naive and lazy when everything goes smoothly. Ants teach us a life lesson of anticipating possible problems in the future.

For example, when your career is going good along with your income, it doesn't mean you can get lazy and carelessly spend your money. It's still important for you to do conscious spending as well as have some savings because you don't know what the future has for you.

Be Optimistic

When little ants face the difficult winter, they know that it won't be forever as well, just like the summer. They believe that summer will come where they can go out and look for food again. When the sun shines in the first day of summer, ants will go out of their anthill, getting ready for work and play. In life, not everything will go as you planned.

As an example, when it's hard for you to get a job after graduated, know that it won't last forever. As long as you always do your best and try hard, the good luck will come to you. When you have hard times, it's better to remind yourself it will go away one day. Ants teach us not to be pessimistic about our life. Instead, we should be optimistic.

Being positive is one of the things that can keep you going. So, have a faith that good days will surely come one day in your life.

Do Your Best

Do you know how much food that ants collect during the summer? The answer is as much as they can. This is a form of excellent work ethic.

We must do everything we can do and give all we have. Ants won't think about how much food that they have collected or why they need to work really hard. They only do whatever they can do for comfortable future.

We normally can achieve success and happiness if we devote 100 percent to every job we can do. If you look around, a lot of successful people are those who are willing to do their best and give what it takes to succeed.

Be Brave

You must once have found an ant walking on your palm. Despite its tiny body, ants are a brave animal to the point they are not afraid of walking on something that is much bigger than them. This bravery is what we should learn from ants. No matter how scary or how big the problem that we might have in the future, we shouldn't be afraid to face it.

If we are not brave enough, we won't be able to grow. Always challenge ourselves and get out of comfort zone because nothing grows in the comfort zone. Don't be afraid to try and learn something new.

Teamwork

This is probably the biggest life lesson that we can learn from ants. As we all know, ants are animals that live in a colony. They all live together in an anthill, and they work together to find food for the whole colony. It's not rare to see two or more ants carrying big food to their anthill. From this, ants teach us well about a good teamwork.

You know, when it comes to work, we don't always work alone all the time. Sometimes, we also need to work with others. We have teams at work, or we need to work together with other co-workers from different departments. For example, the administration staff sometimes has to work together with the finance staff.

If your work requires teamwork, of course, you need to have good teamwork skills to be able to reach your goals. Don't dream about succeed if you and your teammates are still selfish and prioritize your own, personal matters.

Good Adaptive Skills

Ants occasionally move out from one anthill to another. They are nomadic animals, we can say. And sometimes, as humans, we also need to move out, whether move out from our old house or our office to new ones. From ants, we can learn how to be adaptive to new environments. When ants move to a new place, they immediately build a new anthill and start to look for food.

This shows that they have good adaptability. Instead of complaining about how uncomfortable the new environment is, let's learn from ants how to quickly adapt. For your information, having good adaptability is also one of the skills we need to have if we want to survive in this life.

An author named Jim Rohn wrote a book titled Ant Philosophy discussing about the things we can learn from ants. This tiny animal surely looks weak and simple due to its tiny size. But who knows that they can teach us so many useful and meaningful life lessons. So, those are the life lessons to learn from ants. Which one hits you the most?