We have a lot going on at the moment. Buildings demolished, buildings half constructed, piles of materials and ground up stone in random places. The vegetable garden is only half planted, wheelbarrows spread around, and now the car won’t start again. Mud is feature of our lives alongside magnificent beauty of irises, oak trees, and bird chorus. And then there is COVID, family life, school, work, and all that that brings. We have a lot of moving parts, lots of dots which are unconnected at the moment.
What if, in the moment, in the unconnected dot phase, we had the belief of hindsight? What if we could regularly remind ourselves of the certainty of things connecting? Not in a flippant way, but a deep belief. Hindsight is 20-20. We see how the dots are connected after they have been connected. While we are trying to find our way through, trying to connect the dots, we experience stress and anxiety.
And to be frank, I do not see a ‘way through’ right now in our lives. I don’t see how the dots will be connected. This is unsettling. And yet, I have moment of belief that the dots will connect. That in a few years time we’ll have hindsight. Interestingly though, in those moments I have no more clarity of ‘how’ the dots connect, just that they will. And yet, t’s in those moments of belief that the stress and anxiety reduce.
Culturally we’ve been led to believe there is one ‘right’ way of doing things. The one right way is often defined after we’ve done something, perhaps multiple times, and can look back. It’s nearly impossible to determine one ‘right’ way forward in advance. We learn by doing. The path becomes clear by taking the next step and yes, that next can be in any direction, but it is a step. Masterplans and strategies are nice, even useful, but our lives and change never go exactly to plan.
And yet, the next step is helped along by the belief that one day we will be able to see how the dots of our lives are connected. Hindsight is a beautiful thing, but for us to have hindsight we need to have gone on a journey.
The choice is up to us.
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