Play it safe
. One of Lisa’s cardinal rules. I think it started when I was fairly young. Limit risk, know what you’re getting into. Lots of contingency planning, back up plans. Before I get into anything, I’ve usually done extensive research, made sure I know how it could go wrong and make plans to avoid that. I don’t want to deal with things going wrong. I want things nice and buttoned up, within my control, that’s what safe looks like.
So how’s that working for you? Yep, that’s the question I’ve been rolling around in my head, that I’ve been asked. Well, nice and safe, that’s how that’s working. And on the surface, that seems fine, I had a lot going on with my kids, work, family, lots of responsibilities to tend to. So keeping my risks down makes a lot of sense. No time for things to go wrong. But they still did go wrong. And in the meantime, I’d been so busy playing it safe I hadn’t been paying attention to the fact that there wasn’t a lot of joy in my life. It’s hard to have joy where you’re busy being serious all the time.
And it’s also hard to really know what joy is when you don’t let yourself experience the other side, the pain. Staying safe avoids pain. Doesn’t mean you avoid difficulty, but safe steers you around a lot of pain. Don’t be fooled though, the pain can still come, it just comes unexpectedly. Comes when your safe existence is shaken, or shattered.
But if you walk through the pain, when, not if, you survive it, an interesting thing can happen. You start to see more joy, at least I did. Something about the pain strips away your defenses. When I let myself be outside the lines, not be so safe, I starting seeing joy. Joy in the simple things. Joy in every day. Joy that God has had for me all along. I started feeling deeper. My heart felt more compassion for others, more understanding.
When I stopped playing it so safe, that’s when I woke up. That’s when I saw what I’d really been doing. Where the path I’d been walking down had led me. It caused me to rethink choices I’d made, ways I’d engaged with people I cared about. And I didn’t like some of what I saw. But I’d learned what pain felt like now, and it helped me to be brave. I had hard conversations. And there was some pain, because admitting when you’ve made mistakes – even when in the spirit of just staying safe, which you’ve used to justify what you’ve done in the past – it hard.
What’s the point of going down that hard path again? The once elusive joy now shows up more and more often. The braver I am, the more I lean into discomfort, the more joy and peace I’m experiencing. And that is an amazing thing. Give it a try!
I’m a round-about asker, I don’t like to ask people directly to help me. Here’s what that looks like.
If you are among the 1% or less of the population who hasn’t played Monopoly, there are spaces on the board that send you to jail. Your best bet at that point is to use a “get out of jail free card.” It will get you off this spot and back into play without having to roll doubles or pay a $50 fine. I’ve been wondering if we don’t all have a get out of jail free card as it relates we use in our life.
e honest, for those of us who grew up in the 70’s, Wonder Woman was awesome. She had mystical powers, the Lasso of Truth, those cool bracelets, and the tiara. I can’t forget the awesome costume she donned when she headed out to kick some bad guy butt. I think a lot of women, secretly and not so secretly, think that they’re Wonder Woman. She could do it all, nobody could stop her, all while holding down a day job.
This quote, by famed minister Robert Schuller, is used all the time in inspirational quotes or speeches. I’ve always liked it and was thinking about what I would do today during Paddleboard Yoga. Stirring around in my head were happy memories from going to Boulder for the weekend and other adventures I still have on the drawing board in my head but on which I haven’t made a move.
nking this week about emotions. Some people let it all hang out there, no guessing, and others, keep it nice and buttoned up. Emotion is a funny thing. Often times, we’re told not to be so emotional; told to stop crying; big girls don’t cry; told that negative emotion is wrong, or that we shouldn’t show it. I know for me, anger is an emotion I am very uncomfortable with in myself and others. Sadness isn’t on the top 10 list either. The truth is, I don’t know what to do with those emotions. I think society tells women that anger is not good and that we’re seen as weak if we’re sad, or crying. I’ve tried for a long time to live by that standard.
ibe out human frailty, our human condition as a result of all that life brings. I hear a lot, particularly at church, that we’re all broken…and I rally against it.
e told. I’ve realized there’s a distinction between continuing what I’ve started and playing through when I feel I’m called to pursue something in my life. It could be any number of things, it’s that calling, that tug on my heart to see what happens. But man, sometimes I really don’t want to.
weekend with my family, which is always a great time. We are the go, go, go family. One of the nights after dinner, we sat around the table playing Catchphrase. If you haven’t played it, do, it’s a ton of fun. It’s basically charades but using words. My 8 year old nephew was playing with us and it was his turn. His clue was “that thing you do when you parents want you to do something you don’t want to do.” Do it anyways? Obey? Finally someone said, “Suck it up.” Amazingly, that was it! So interesting to see an 8 year old perspective of what it’s like when you’re faced with something unpleasant.