PRACTICE: Ditch your habitual exercise routine (or couch time) for one day this week and take a long walk with the intention of paying attention to your surroundings.
As long as the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, you and I have the grand opportunity to start over. Sometimes that is all that we can do! There is no redeeming the mess that we have made and to continue to try is futile.
I almost, always start with a recipe when I am cooking something for the first time. I will review the ingredients, think about how they play together and if the recipe requires an ingredient not readily available, I will get creative with a substitute. Sometimes I add something just because I want to add my special touch. Nine out of ten times, this creative addition works. (practice with caution when baking; baking soda instead of baking powder is disastrous)
It is the one time out of ten that the substitution doesn’t work that forces me to dump and start over.
Here’s what gets me about dumping and starting over. I fret about the time invested – I can’t recapture that. I move to calculating the cost of the ingredients trashed -wasted resources – money. Said another way – the initial thoughts are all about what is lost. It isn’t until I start over that I fully appreciate what I gained from the dumping experience, knowledge. I now know where my “touch” doesn’t work. Other times, I follow the directions haphazardly, paying little to no attention to what I am doing because I have done this a million times and I create a mess. This kind of screw up forces me out of the “habit” zone and into my “pay attention” zone. You can bet the next time around, I will read and do versus doing and then reading the instructions after my failed attempt.
Life is that way! Don’t get caught up in time or resources wasted…you planned your day for an hour work out but lingered too long over lunch, didn’t finish your work on time, so had only 30 minutes. You are ungrateful for the 30 minutes, gripe because you wanted an hour and under -utilized the thirty minutes. Dump that mindset and start over.
Life is filled with distractions seemingly designed to make us live haphazardly, dump the “habit” and pick up the “pay attention” zone. Did you really loose the time and resources, or did you just purchase something more precious? An awareness to the details of daily living.
As long as the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, we have the opportunity to start over…seize it when necessary.
Joel 2:25
PONDER THIS THOUGHT: I find letting go and starting over challenging.
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