The reason this proverb has lived for centuries is not that it is witty. But because it is unapologetically true. And the meaning is quite simple – you only understand something when you go through it.
We keep speculating about what we are, what we love, and what we might become. But our true self remains hidden until it is tested in the silent corridors of lived reality.
This was something I learned reluctantly.
A few years ago, I was sitting in the back corner of the campus library near the history shelves, long after the closing time had been announced. The fluorescent lamps flickered with an apathetic persistence. And the pages before me, with their philosophical promises of identity and consciousness, offered an explanation that I didn’t quite relate to.
I felt disconnected. I felt a sense of detachment from my own self. I couldn’t understand it at first. But something within me knew that understanding words was not the same as understanding myself.
It is much easier to explain life than to live it.
We measure ourselves through borrowed metrics. Productivity, admiration, efficiency, endurance, and many more. But these tools seldom tell the truth. We can never measure who we really are until we know ourselves.
An individual may appear calm. But they may be experiencing pain internally.
They may seem confused. But they may be on their journey of healing.
We talk about the self a lot.
But we can’t know it properly unless we look inside ourselves.
Looking inward is not romantic. It is disorienting and difficult. It makes us face the reality that we may not want to know. But in this confusion, we often understand an important truth – experience is the only way to understand some things.
It is like tasting pudding.
You cannot tell what it tastes like when you are away.
You must taste it yourself.
Similarly, we can perceive life through living it.
In seeking the truth within ourselves, we often discover something mundane – a love that was not nurtured, a loss that was never grieved, a wound, neatly wrapped away.
These are not moments that are accompanied by drama. They are silent, and they transform the way life is experienced. Nothing appears to be different on the surface. But within, nearly everything changes.
No one can hand you self-understanding.
Someone can show us the right direction. But they can’t walk the path. Words can speak about depth. But they cannot take the place of the descent. Everyone has to face the difference between the life they live and the life they truly feel. In that struggle, honesty appears. And a deeper connection with the self starts to grow.
Words, plans, and beliefs don’t prove understanding.
Living does. Just staying with the confusion. Not running away. Getting through one ordinary day at a time.
The taste of the pudding is indeed in the eating.
We can know who we are only when we are brave enough to look inside.