Recovering (?) Type-A

Quick! Name something that comes back to "bite you in the butt" in life! I'll start...

PERFECTIONIST PERSONALITIES!

You know what else starts with P? That's right, Pretty starts with P, and Pretty has a perfectionist personality PLUS. As a recovering type-A (am I recovering though, or just continually backsliding?), I make mistakes then berate myself pretty hard on a fairly regular schedule. It's partly rushing (because I love a finished task), and partly doing too many things at one time (I'm doing this and this and this...might as well do that too), which is not an equation for perfection, but failure. It's like being impatient to finish a hand-knit sweater, maybe because I also want to finish the matching socks and bake some cookies, so I convince myself that a mistake isn't a mistake until I've bound off a sweater that has three sleeves! 

Special Note: This knitter, like most knitters, has only two arms. Thankfully, that is also true of the sweater she is currently working on...

Still, there is evidence all over my world of the mistakes I've made. Some of my blunders were bigger than others, and I am most thankful for the ones I have owned up to, shared with appropriate people, and learned from. 

I am thankful that I had another opportunity to learn to slow down again this week. Error Ahoy! Believe me when I tell you that I am not continually thankful for this mistake or any other, but in hindsight I am hopeful that I have learned from it. In this moment, what I am always thankful for is the people God has surrounded me with. The ladies in my Bible study have prayed for me as I floundered through the week, and they brought me back from the brink of feeling badly and beating myself up to admitting guilt and working through it. Ultimately, there was nothing I could do (this time) to fix the flub, so I admitted fault and apologized profusely while I prayed and knit my way through it, almost finishing sock 1 of a new pair as well as the progress on the sweater. 

All of that to say this: Everyone makes mistakes, and errors are almost always inconvenient. Nobody died, so it could be worse, and isn't that a good place to sit? As long as I can say, "It could be worse," I know it's probably going to be ok. This is true all throughout life, whether it refers to my mistakes or the consequences of another's actions, and I have been in situations that I don't think could have been worse...but most of life is somewhere between "Great!" and "Can't-Get-Worse," so that's where I live best. Could it be worse? Yes? Then it's going to be ok! Maybe not "Great!," but that's what a recovering Type-A needs to know...it doesn't have to be perfect. Sometimes ok is truly OK!

Are you like me, a straight-A student that can't let go of that one B in 7th grade, or the mistake that she made last week? Or are you gentle with yourself because not one of us is perfect? I hope you tend toward the latter, as it is a kinder and gentler way to treat both with yourself others. If you're struggling like I am, I hope you'll hop up onto the bus. When we struggle and grow together, we all get a little further down the road. 

Thanks for stopping by, and Knit in Good health!

People Are People, Wherever You Go

We are all ________________.

Fill in the blank, please.

I have been watching, and listening, and my heart hurts.

I know that I am not alone. This is how I fill in that blank:

We are all people.

Despite the color of our skin, we are all people.
Regardless of our sexual identity, we are all people.
Independent of our political affiliation, we are all people.
Creationists, agnostics, scientists, we are all people.
Introvert, extrovert, ambivert, we are all people.

We are all people, and as such…
…we all have value.
…we all have feelings.
…we all have things to say.
…we all have lessons to learn.

…we all have a responsibility to one another.

We are all people.

I have friends, both in person and online, that I do not agree with. I do not publicly “call them out” when they state their opinions, because we are all people. Each of us is entitled to our own opinion.

I have friends who are hurting because someone has or is publicly calling them out, trying to make them feel “less than” because their ideologies do not line up. Somehow, someone has decided that it is their responsibility to “correct” others who have different backgrounds, beliefs, experiences and opinions. This breaks my heart.

I have been ridiculed…sometimes overtly and sometimes very subtly. My opinions, my emotions and my convictions have been discounted…sometimes by people I care deeply about. This does not give me license to lash out.

I have heard that hurt (adjective) people hurt (verb) people. But why?

Whatever happened to “Two wrongs don’t make a right.”?

Whatever happened to “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.”?

Whatever happened to “I’d like to buy the world a Coke.”?

Ok, that last one is a little silly. But still, it applies.

Are you lonely?

Are you feeling unheard?

Are you weary of the unknown in this season of pandemic?

Are you weary of the unknown in this season of elections?

Are you weary of the unknown in this season of social unrest?

Well, so am I. What can we do about it?

We can recognize that we are all people.

We can respect each other, even when we don’t agree.

We can refuse to add to the hate, the hurt and the sense of helplessness.

Refuse to speak disparagingly about the good someone has done because they made a mistake somewhere along the line.

Refuse to discount everything a person stands for because you don’t agree on one point.

Refuse to be bullied into hateful behaviors. 

You have a brain.

Do your own research.

Decide what you stand for.

You do you, but please don’t hurt anyone else.

We are all people. Let’s live like we know that.

Maybe it will help us make the world a kinder place.

If not for ourselves, for our children. And our grandchildren.

We are all people. 

Thanks for stopping by, people. 

Knit, Live and Love in Good Health!