BABY STEPS

[We've become such a society that expects immediate results and instant gratification that I fear we're in danger of forgetting some simple ideas--such as, learning takes time.]

Have you noticed? Starting something new is no easy-peasy task.

For example—you retire. Ahead of you are seemingly endless days without your former 8 or 10 or 12 hours per day earmarked for a particular task or series of tasks. So you decide to tackle something new, say, woodworking.

Great! Get some books on woodworking. Go to the library and check out their back issues of magazines devoted to the subject. Find a mentor! (That’s the best of all—good old hands-on, show-me-how teaching.) (And an experienced mentor probably has all the expensive tools you may not want to buy right away. Check out the price of a table saw, and you’ll see what I mean.)

After a few days/weeks/months of perusing the projects available, you decide on one. But—your mentor says, “better start with something smaller” (simpler) (less expensive). And you’re already discouraged. You really want to see that small (you thought) jewelry chest come to life. It’d make a great gift for your wife/daughter/auntie. Hmmm.

Now, why should you be discouraged? Everything has to start somewhere—the biggest, most complicated, and expensive projects—all had a humble beginning.

Discouraged? Well, of course you are! If you’ve lived long enough to be approaching retirement (see paragraph 2 above) you’ve not only learned a lot along the way, you’ve been injected with the idea that NOW is the best time to do anything, and NOW is when it’ll happen.

No Practice. No Trial & Error. No Baby Steps leading to a final goal. Uh-huh.

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I’ve now been retired more than 15 years. Seems like every day I’m learning something new—not because I forgot how to do something, nor because I’m always trying different things. No, because every day’s learning comes with practicing what I’ve been doing for years and years. The take-away for me is this: The longer I practice, the more likely I am to reach beyond where I’ve always been; and at that point, I embark on a new journey of learning. Same subject. Now deeper.

Somewhere I read that writing a novel doesn’t teach you how to write the next one. You learn that when you write it. So writing a novel teaches me how to write this one—and next time . . . . More practice. More trial and error. More learning.

A similar thing happens with painting, which is my current creative activity. I watch YouTube videos, I practice, I learn something, I paint using that technique. Sometimes I remember that technique and use it again and again. Then the next week’s video goes into detail about something else, and I’m on the learning curve again.

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Learning also happens when we make mistakes. (Some people say that’s exactly when learning occurs.) 

• Another example from my life: I’ve been knitting since my teens. Learning as I go. Trying new things. Now that knitting is only an occasional activity, I don’t tackle ambitious projects. But I still love the process of producing knitted and purled stitches in patterns. Then comes the day when I’ve been talking with my knitting buddy and not counting stitches or paying attention, and my project has gone into some kind of fit. It no longer looks like a square dishcloth, but now resembles part of an elephant, or maybe a hippopotamus. Backtracking from my mistake causes me to practice how to un-knit, how far back to actually go, and whether I can figure out where I can pick up the pattern again.

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Learning can be discouraging. I’ll agree with that about 97%. But why is that?

I suspect it has several causes:

•      Pride – if we’ve learned a lot of stuff already in our lives, why should this new thing take very long?
•     Time – along with our pride, there’s the time element—it keeps speeding up (seems    that way) and if I don’t learn this new thing pretty soon, I’ll be too old/infirm or lose interest completely.
•     Peer pressure – really? About learning something new? You betcha. Look at any magazine article or online set of classes. How many of them say something like “10 ways to look better in a week” or “7 days to a new you” or “make this table and chairs in a weekend”? Who says it can be done in X number of hours/days/weeks? Better question: Who cares?

My approach may not be yours. But here it is, if you care to hear it:

• It takes as long as it takes.
• It may take longer if you have more to learn. (Remember, those baby steps, practice, trial and error, etc.)
• It may take longer because you get interrupted by Life. (Remember this one? Life is what happens when you’re making plans.)
• It may take longer because you have to let go of somebody else’s expectation—and here’s a good place to remember: you don’t have to tell other people what you plan to do. They’ll give you advice, keep asking when it’s done, and wondering why it’s taking so long.

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Baby Steps. Think about a baby learning to walk. First there’s crawling, then standing upright. Next, walking along the couch, holding on. Then a tentative step away from the edge of the couch. A step or two. Then a fall. Unless the baby is hurt, it grunts and gets up again and tries to take off on two feet, no hands. Sometimes it even giggles when it falls. Now that's worth hearing.

Most of us started out like that—so why not use the Baby Steps method the rest of our lives? It worked before.

I leave you with two more words:

• EXPLORE - what you'll be doing while you're learning
• DISCOVER - it's all part of learning

Have a wonderful week filled with exploration and discovery.

Blessings,

Thursday's Child

 

 

 BALANCING ACT

You're probably saying, "This isn't new. Everybody knows practically everything in life is about balancing stuff--juggle this, try not to lose that, etc."

Don't you just LOVE those "everybody knows" generalizations? They're often so true. And, so not true.

Let's look at the true part first.

From my own experience, but not going back to infancy, I recall having to choose--if I wanted to take shorthand and typing in high school, I had to give up some other class. Once I'd wheedled my way into taking "five solid subjects," I could do both shorthand and typing, along with whatever else I had in mind. As I recall, my junior year it was French, first being offered at our school that year. (Latin and Spanish had always been available, but they didn't call my name.) Balancing was beginning.

After high school--college years, first time around; again choose courses, try not to have all of them on the same days if I wanted to keep some free time to study or do homework. And then finances came into it--a little part-time job at a tiny grocery store near campus, or typing stuff for professors on campus, almost anything that could be done for a few bucks a week, so long as it wasn't baby-sitting. (I never did get the hang of baby-sitting; my children will back me up on this.) More balancing.

So, on to marriage--children--preserving sanity: all a balancing act. Plus, somewhere in there I was encouraged by my mother-in-law to finish my degree; so I signed up for one course, then two, and finally managed to emerge with a B.A. from Indiana University. With four kids at home and a husband who worked all day. Balancing ramped up sharply.

If you haven't tried keeping a marriage and a family going while conjugating French verbs and writing "learned" essays about Elizabethan poets, I must warn you: as Betty Davis said about aging, "It ain't for sissies."

But here I am, writing to you, lo, these many years later, having survived somehow (by hook or by crook, as Granny used to say), to let you know it's possible to balance your life events and not go under for the third time.

Well, that's enough about life being entirely a balancing act. Now let's look at the flip side.

What is not part of the balancing act? Or to put it another way, what can't be turned off, put aside temporarily, or set in stone?

Okay, science being what it is, and technology having got into the act, the nay-sayers are probably right in saying "practically everything" is a balancing act. But I offer up some examples of what is not part of the balancing act:

• our genetic make-up may not be set in stone, but it's pretty much here to stay; I can't turn off the fact that my blue-eyed parents made it virtually impossible for me to have brown eyes; nor can I modify whichever genetic code my grandmother gave me so I can be taller. The best I can do are contact lenses and high-heeled shoes.
• once a pregnancy is in evidence, it can't be set aside temporarily so the child can be born at a more convenient time. (Ask anybody--is there really a more convenient time?)
• and at least at this time, we can't live forever--our time on planet Earth is limited. We're not even allowed to know the day and hour of our departure. We just have the ticket to ride. (But don't discount science and technology--they landed people on the moon; it may just be a matter of time.)

You'll have some of your own, and I'll bet they're dillies.

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How do we do it, you ask?

All depends on how deeply you're invested in what you want.

In order to finish my degree, I had to let go of some "hafta" tasks: not every meal was made from scratch; baked goods appeared mostly at birthday time, and kids learned how to make a nourishing meal for themselves. Laundry was done on specific days, which changed with my class schedule. These modifications didn't always go as planned, but they made it possible for me to read a 700-page 19th century novel, in French, so I could pass the exam that week.

It boiled down to "keep your eyes on the prize."

Then when we had school vacations, I could sew or cook or bake; I could even not read unless I wanted to, and if I wanted to read, it wouldn't be anything that appeared on any college reading list--it would be a modern mystery novel, all about clever detectives solving problematic crimes in fascinating places.

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I'm still not very good at the balancing act, even though I've been at it for more decades than I ever thought I'd attain.

My check register and I currently don't agree with the bank, nor with each other.

I've let my sewing machines waste away for lack of use so I could spend more time painting pictures.

My current writing project stalled and finally stopped altogether--though I can't figure out why it broke down. I don't want to shove it to the side of the road and leave it to rust because I think it can be repaired, but still--. So I started a new piece, which is moving along, page by page.

So though I may not be good at balancing, I do believe in it. There are no prizes, since it's not a competition. There are no awards for best balancing--but you do get to keep your sense of well-being when it works out. 

Best wishes for balancing challenges to come! And success!

Blessings,

Thursday's Child

 

ENCOURAGEMENT

YOU CAN DO THIS!

KEEP GOING!

GOOD JOB!

WELL DONE!

WAY TO GO!

Encouraging thoughts and actions are everywhere. Look at the above list--how many of those things have you heard--or said--in the past month?

There seems to be a movement afoot for kids (of all ages) to hear encouraging words--in school, at home, on the playing field, at a piano lesson--you name it, encouragement is the way to go.

You don't have to be a kid to receive and respond to encouragement. So let's look at some ways we can keep the encouragement going.

• simple kindnesses--saying thank you for something done for you (no matter how small); smiling at someone you don't know, just because you feel like it (maybe they need it); letting another shopper in front of you at the checkout (you're in no hurry, he is).
• notes and cards--if you like to write little notes of encouragement, then do that. But if you're "tongue-tied" with a pen in hand, send a card that says "thinking of you." (This is especially helpful if you're writing to someone who has had a death of someone close.) If it's appropriate, let the person know you pray for them.
• celebrate a success--let someone know you appreciate the effort they made to attain a goal.
• small gifts--sometimes a "no-reason present" can lift weary spirits.

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Famous people often mention encouragement they've received while they were working hard to get somewhere; here are a few you might recognize:

No one in my family was a reader of literary fiction. So, I didn't have encouragement, but I didn't have discouragement, because I don't think anybody knew what that meant.   Amy Tan

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Taking an interest in what others are thinking and doing is often a much more powerful form of encouragement than praise.   Robert Martin

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The essential support and encouragement comes from within, arising out of the mad notion that your society needs to know what only you can tell it.   John Updike

Blessings (and keep on keepin' on!)

Thursday's Child