Dogs Learn Tricks

"You can't teach and old dog new tricks."  

This saying is so old, we don't even know where it came from.  Does it apply to humans as well?

I don't think so.  

When Bobby wants to learn to throw a baseball, he picks it up, copies what he has seen, and observes if the result.  If the result is not what he wanted, he picks up the ball, and tries again until it's right.  Once it's right, he is proud of his accomplishment and celebrates by continuing to do the very thing he set out to do. . .  he throws the ball more!  Isn't this fun!

When Robert decides he wants to learn how to throw a baseball, he looks it up on the internet.  He studies the proper way to hold the ball.  He studies every detail of the technique.  He researches the history of baseball and watches videos of the greatest players to ever touch a ball.  Then he asks an old friend who played ball in college for some pointers.  After that, Robert buys the best ball and glove that he can afford and heads off to the park.  He looks around to make sure nobody is paying any attention to him.  Then, he begins, with self-conscious reservation, to throw the ball.  After the first attempt, he divides his attention between thinking about every detail of his technique, and making sure that nobody saw his first try.  Once the park gets a little busier, he packs up and goes home. 

Can you tell the difference?   Doesn't one sound so much more fun than the other?  

We, as adults, expect a lot from ourselves.  If it's not right the first time, it's wrong.  Due to the fear of failure, the appreciation for the process of gaining a new skill is lost on us.  We fill ourselves with doing everything EXCEPT what we set out to do.  

The next questions from my adult mind beg, "Why do we do this?  Is it out of insecurity?  Is this a new process, or have people been doing this for years?  Am I alone in this?"  The truth is. . .  IT DOESN'T MATTER.   Simply by observing this and analyzing the problem to pieces is exactly why we never fix it, just like Robert trying to throw the ball, we do everything around our goal, but somehow avoid what we wanted to accomplish in the first place

How do we get around this? 

Do.

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The Importance of Every Day

N. B. Talks

There are important things in this world.  Things that we all connect to.  Things that drive us every day to lift our heavy heads weighed down by dreams from the gravitational pull of the comfort of a soft pillow.  Some people hold these things sacred, fighting their own internal battle to get through each day, only showing the world what they think we want to see.  Some people pour every thought and every action in sight of others, to gain affirmation that they are on the right side of their warring thoughts.  

Nonetheless, we are all fighting something.  Is it the urge to eat that brownie?  The fear of being alone?  The sorrow of loss?  The fear of a wrong choice?  The denial of acceptance?  The lack of approval? 

We, as humans, are seekers.  We have the urge to do more, be more, explore, study, and understand both ourselves and the world.  Some of us do that by traveling the world and experiencing other cultures and life views and applying those to get a better grip on who we are.  Some of us get married young and have a family, living the classic American story, to watch a child grow into a fully realized person to give ourselves perspective on life within our world.  

All of us deviate from our journeys from time to time, sometimes hiding in the brush beside the road of truth, watching others walk by, sometimes judging those who have a path, and sometimes wishing someone would drag us from our hiding spaces and point us in the right direction.

Understanding that we all share this battle, makes if feel less like a battle.  Once we acknowledge that we all fight for the same cause, there becomes less to fight against, until one day we all realize we're all flowing down the same stream. . .   sometimes at different rates, sometimes down different channels, but we're all going the same direction.  To inhibit someone else's flow makes you the rock in a flood of water.  You will be worn down to sand and sink to the bottom, only to be overcome by the rushing rapids of other's success.   However, if we become the water, moving with the rest of the stream, it will give us the momentum to forge our own paths to get to the same destination.  

~N