One of my good friends once told me, "Everything in life is a process, just as you finish one another is beginning or has already started. Maybe it began and you were unaware. Take everything one day at a time. A process can't be rushed."
It can be applied to the simplest of things. You cannot force flour to be a cake without going through every step. You can't force a ball of yarn to be a sweater without first knowing how to knit, and the actual knitting. An old wives tale I find to be true is watching water won't make it boil. (I have zero patience for this, thank God for electric kettles).
However in other areas of your life other than domestic skills it is important to have patience. Arriving at an answer is not an immediate gratification. Otherwise we would all be on a guided tour. Back to the watching water boil. Like watching a pot of water on the stove, I've come to notice that diligently watching and timing things wont make them happen.
If you have been an avid reader of my blog, first I love you, and second you probably remember the posts about my lack of Chinese when I arrived. I would listen to my friends speak with such grace and precision and wonder when the hell I would be able to do that. People would teach me phrases when we were out and about and I would repeat them ad nauseam only to forget them 5 minutes later. I am not sure when it happened, but the moment I stopped thinking about where I wasn't with the language I was able to string sentences together. I am hoping the confused looks I get are because they are surprised I can speak Chinese, not "What the hell are you trying to say?"
I can't say it enough but I am really enjoying these Chinese yoga classes. I needed some yoga drill sergeants to improve. If I've noticed one thing from the classes its that if it isn't challenging it won't change you. I also have come to notice, not sure if it is true, that if you aren't corrected on things when you're wrong your growth can be hindered. I am so proud of myself for mastering headstand, one of those crazy tricks I put on a pedestal. Even as I was learning I couldn't stick the pose till I thought about the process, not the product. And if I rushed into it I would painfully tumble forward. Patience is really a virtue, and in this case, a dodged neck injury.
I'll be frank. I am not currently at my ideal weight and it is nobody's fault but my own. Beer specials, midnight breakfast, wing night, and bubble tea will creep up on you. Well I decided to make a change and not eat so poorly, Netflix binge, and get my ass running again. What was stopping me? Horribly painful shin splints that would only go away after a few weeks of diligence. I did not enjoy a single minute of toughing through it, it was like scaling an endless mountain of charlie horses and broken glass in your shins. Processes can't be rushed, they need to be seen as what exists between point A and B,because teleporting would be too easy. I was recently having one of those hormonal days when you feel like the sky is falling, ladies you know? My friend told me, "Once you stop thinking about getting to your goal weight, it will come off so quickly." Very true, I stopped paying attention to it a few weeks ago and noticed I can run two miles without wheezing again.
I would say I don't typically enjoy the stretch between A and B. However this time around I have come to appreciate it a lot more. Every process, every work in progress, if I can remember the in between I can appreciate the end result a lot more and stay curious for what is ahead.
:)
ReplyDeletegood one Erika.