“Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don’t give up.”
We are not meant to live in isolation. What makes us healthy and whole is the connections we form with one another. With our families. Our friends. Our colleagues and our community… The thing we need the most to feel healthy has become harder to get.
After more than 30 years in the field of social work, I know one thing to be true. We do not need to be victims to our situation. We have choices to make, each and every day about how we want to live our lives. How we choose to show up for ourselves and each other.
Practice #17 - Take it One Piece at a Time
The other day I began a new puzzle. I opened the box for the first time to find 1000 pieces of colorful cardboard staring at me. My husband laughed. “That’s going to take you forever.”
I fished out the end pieces one by one and began to put the outside frame together.
When my kids were little they were obsessed with Legos. Their rooms were filled with tiny plastic pieces. Lego structures filled every flat surface. The Millennium Falcon. The Death Star. A soccer stadium with 22 players. Legos came as birthday gifts and Christmas presents and just because we happened to be at Target. They were everywhere. Lego “guys” in the bathtub, in the laundry and even under my bare feet.
I know you know what I mean.
Like life, Legos have the potential to overwhelm, except for one thing. When you open a new box of Legos, there aren’t 600 loose pieces staring back at you. The Lego gods knew what they were doing. They package the Millennium Falcon into different sections, each in its own bag.
It is a classic problem solving strategy. Break a big problem into smaller pieces.
Try this:
Some days seem overwhelming. Be patient with yourself. Whatever you’re trying to do, break it into small pieces. Go slow. Keep showing up. You can do this. One Piece at Time.
