How can you learn if you never know the reason things happen?

No offense intended Nicky, that's just how I see things.

No offense taken Alchemy. We see things differently that's all. It doesn't mean either one of us is right or wrong. We are both on different journey's, hopefully towards the same destination.

I'm wondering if it's really a matter of trust?

Let me give a non-spiritual example.

Way back when part of one leg, just above and at the knee was injured, and swelled up immensely. After countless hours waiting for the MD at his office (they failed to tell him emergency) I was whisked out the back door to the hospital and admitted. After a few days in the hospital I was released and the MD told me to "stay off your feet... total rest!!!"
Well, being a very active person at the time, I did the best I could but finally did use crutches to stand and wash the dishes one day. When the MD heard about it (can't recall how he did) he went "ballistic" and yelled at me because "You have a blood clot in your knee and it could have killed you!"

Now. IF the MD had just told me that, about the blood clot, of course I wouldn't have moved..I mean I would have used the toilet while lying down So I really didn't trust the MD did I? In HIS discernment as to what I really needed to do.

To me, to ask God, "Why" is saying, "I don't really trust Your judgment on this God, did You really have a good reason to let this occur?"

But yes, I can see where God uses patterns to teach us to obey, to follow and we keep going through similar events until we "get it"...but I've never known Him to tell me the Why of something, the learning curve was for me to work it on my "own"....

Judaism teaches that G-d will keep putting you in the same situations over and over again until you learn your lesson. It's for this reason and this reason only that I believe I NEED to know what I was supposed to have learned from every test I'm given from G-d so I can keep moving forward in my life. This is just my belief and how I was raised, and I've seen it happen in my life first hand.

I'm not asking for G-d to tell me why, but I do need Him to give me clues to the lessons He wants me to learn from them. I've tried figuring it out myself, but have just found myself repeating situations, which means to me that I didn't learn the lesson He wanted me to learn.

Oh I agree rr--- but to me the "why" others might ask becomes a "what" for me... as in, "What do You want me to learn from this?"
As for the "why"...I'm not going to understand the full mind of God even if He does try to explain it!

That is true. I guess for me it's also more of asking what lessons am I supposed to be learning so I don't repeat the situation rather than why did this happen in the first place. It obviously happened to teach me a lesson.

Yeah repeating to learn is a toughie. Generally when that occurs I'm not really back at the very beginning, but farther along the path and repeating something, with already learned insight, allows me to continue better? Does that make sense?

But again, asking Why gets me nowhere so I've learned not to ask.

Again, I'm not asking why something has happened, but asking what the lesson was I'm supposed to learn so I don't keep repeating it. If I don't learn the lesson, I will keep repeating the same situations over and over again until I learn them. I feel like I'm going in circles because I think I learn the lesson, but then find myself in the same situation years later, so I obviously didn't learn the right lesson.

Aww shucks. I guess that's why we need therapists to help us see the whole picture, see what we are missing when we set out to change?

I was watching Extreme Weight loss last night, a lady at 304 lbs or so and with issues of needing men to approve of her and wanting to get away from that... and what did she do? Began a relationship with someone while she was at the rehab center!!! The host quickly confronted her. Sometimes that rut is really deep.

Acceptance is key