One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar. ~ Helen Keller
I have noticed a pattern over the past year. Have you ever taken your child to the doctor’s office after days of worry, only to have their symptoms improve significantly when you arrive? Have you ever gone to sell your car or your house, and when you are showing it to someone, something breaks for the first time? What about the days when you know you are going to be late or the kids are going to fall off their bikes? And then you are late and they do fall.
I think that we are so much more powerful than we ever imagined. I have heard this repeatedly but it never completely resonated until I started looking at my programmed thoughts and how they very consistently deliver the results I think about, good and bad. I think the reason we feel better when we arrive at the doctor’s office is because we finally feel like we will have an answer and we no longer need to worry. It is about detaching from the outcome.
When we worry about someone liking a house or car and we are anxious about selling it, things go wrong. When we worry that our kids will fall off their bikes and they do, it is not that we were right, it is that our fear, “be careful, slow down, use your brakes” offered a powerful message that compelled us to communicate that we did not trust they were safe, so they weren’t. Decisions are overwhelming when we focus on managing outcomes. When we decide to focus on well-being and the floodgates open, the outcome far surpasses what we ever thought we were capable of creating.
Ever since the day we communicated our desire to wander the world with our three children indefinitely, we have heard the following statements:
- What about their chances of getting into college?
- What about their activities?
- What about your extended family?
- What about retirement?
- What about all of your stuff?
I am so grateful to these brave folks for communicating their fears with me because I have learned so much from them. At first, I listened, internalized their sentiments, and thought maybe I don’t actually know what I am doing. Then it hit me. I will fall off my bike if I heed their warnings. At this point, I had a choice. I could either justify my reasons for going with a well thought out bulleted list, or I could just shift my energy to those who believed in our success even without proof.
I realized the most important thing I can do for myself and my family in preparing for this journey is to focus on our well-being and see our success now. I need to feel that sense of well-being before I drive to the doctor’s office, know that the car will run beautifully when someone test drives it, and know that the kids will stay on the bike at their chosen speed, safely. This is the only way I will be ready for the days that we do fall. Preparing for the fall, only guarantees it will happen and that seems like a bad idea.
The journey starts now and uncertainty is my new travel companion. It was there all along, but I was scared of its potential and now its energy propels me into the unknown with an insatiable desire to keep going, seeing, doing, and being.
