Who Said Life Lessons Have To Be Hard?
Life is full of simple lessons. Here's one that still makes me laugh at myself.
At the time, I was glad no one saw what I had done—like a cat that slips on wet pavement and pretends that it never happened. But here I am telling the story, anyway.
Let’s see what you think.
We have a wood stove that keeps the house very warm. I keep a big pot on top of the stove. In the summer, I actually use it for cooking. In the winter, it holds water. I fill the pot every morning with about 4 gallons of water. On extra-wintry days, by the next morning, it is empty.
It is about the same amount of water the dehumidifier takes out of the air in the basement on very humid days in the summer.
In the summer, I pour the water out. In the winter, I pour the water in. It’s the yin and yang of seasons.
To fill the pot, I keep a 2-gallon plastic pitcher in a cupboard by the sink. One morning, I was thinking about getting to a class, so while looking at the clock, I bent down and grabbed the pitcher, stuck it in the sink, turned the water on, and went to get something done for a minute while it filled.
When I returned, I laughed. I hadn’t grabbed a pitcher; I had grabbed a strainer and tried to fill it with water.
There is that yin-yang thing again. A pitcher holds water in—a strainer lets water out.
I love that the minutia of life is always symbolic, leading the way, guiding us to the rhythm of the universe that we are either in harmony with or out of step. This makes my pitcher and strainer a modern-day version of the cloud by day and the fire by night.
Okay, so they were leading Moses and his people to the Promised Land, perhaps referring to something this simple is out of proportion. On the other hand, maybe not.
What is the Promised Land but a place where harmony and good are the reigning power?
Does that mean a specific land or place? Thankfully, it doesn’t. (Don’t you wish everyone knew this?)
The Promised Land lies within our own grasp as we escape from the imprisonment of false thinking.
We are escaping when we don’t jump to judgment and comparison. In the summer, we take water out of the air, and in the winter, we put it back in.
Neither one of them is wrong. It is the way of the season.
There is no reason to judge the strainer just because it didn’t hold water. Its job is to let water go. If I wanted to strain spaghetti, I wouldn’t grab a pitcher. Its job is to hold water.
So now, to apply this lesson practically to my life. I ask myself to check where I am pouring my resources.
What have I tried to make work one way when it’s not meant to work that way?
What idea do I think holds water but instead lets the essence drain away?
I remind myself not to pour resources I want to make useful into something that leaks.
This could be people, ideas, advertising, work things, time, attention. The list is endless.
On the other hand, I have to keep filling the pitcher that holds things with something for it to hold.
If I don’t turn on the water in the sink every morning, that pitcher never fills up.
For example, I remind myself to purchase (fill the pitcher) the best advertising because good advertising brings good results.
I know this life lesson is also a reminder to pay attention to what I am doing and be present in the moment.
Instead of judging (the “Oh good grief moment”) or comparing, I can use this event to learn a life lesson the easy way.
Who said life lessons have to be hard? That’s only a belief that can be put into a strainer and drained away!