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What you cannot do

Apparently because running two businesses and raising kids isn’t enough excitement for our family, we decided to build a house.  As a result, I have this strange, but constant desire to just pass by the lot to check on it.  You know, just to see how it’s doing.  There’s no house there, mind you.  Not even an ounce of concrete or steel.  Just dirt and grass.  I don’t know if it’s because it’s so close by, or if I’m nesting, or if it’s just my mama heart dreaming of the life full of memories we’ll build there.

But nonetheless, it draws me.  

Yesterday on the way home from school we quickly passed by the lot.  On our way out, I saw a fun little clearing through the trees.  “Let’s take that trail back to the road!”  The picture above shows how well that went.  I swear, it looked like a dry dirt trail and suddenly it was quicksand.  I could tell the wheels were spinning.  “Not to worry!  We’ll be out of here in a jiffy!”  I popped her in 4-wheel drive. . . I got nothing.

Still completely stuck.

While inside, I instantly felt the fear of not really knowing if we’d get out, and the frustration of  wasted time I didn’t have, I instructed everyone to get out of the car.  I asked them to hunt for branches, rocks, or anything we could put under the tires to get some traction.  They obliged.  As soon as every tire was skirted with sticks, I asked the kids to step away while I threw it in gear to get us out.  (I asked one to grab a picture of the car for Dad, and lucky for us, he documented the entire scene with videos and multiple pictures.  Ha!)  And it worked!
Here’s the deal. 
No one ever taught me how to get a jeep out of the mud.  I’ve never taken a step by step course, or downloaded a worksheet with all the best practices. In fact, growing up, the closest I ever got to this kind of thing was driving my dad’s car off the road into a ditch and somehow getting it wedged between the two walls, but let’s just stick with this jeep story.  The point is, I’ve learned a few tricks along the way, because I’ve been stuck before.  I’ve had to rack my brain to think of anything and everything to get me unstuck.  I’ve tried a lot of things that didn’t work and learned a few that have.
Experience is a wonderful teacher.  
There have been many times it would have been easier to call a tow-truck.  It would have made sense for me to shrug my shoulders and wave the white flag.  I was stuck and I didn’t know how to get unstuck.  But I’m learning how to “sail my ship”, or drive my jeep, as it may be.  And that means venturing out into the unknown.  It means enlisting help.  It means embracing the ends of what I know, in order to discover what can be.
“I’m always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it.” ~ Pablo Picasso

The next time you feel stuck in the mud, and need to do something you feel like you simply cannot do, remember this ridiculous image.  Sure, you may not know how to get unstuck.  Maybe you’ve never been here before and the odds seem impossible.  Maybe it’s obvious you can’t do this on your own.  Enlist help.  Try something you’ve never tried.  Maybe it will work.

Maybe it won’t. 

But you will learn something if you don’t give up.  You’ll learn something you never could have learned by waving the white flag at the first sign of fear.

You’ve got this.  You can learn how to do this. 

I’m cheering for you, muddy feet and all.

to more love,

Crystal

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