Permission to Try.
How do you find out what you love – if you never let yourself try?
A week of planning: tiles picked, sizes measured, table and chairs ordered. Then, one step before the finish line, the realization – I don't want this. Most of us would file that under wasted time. Bella refuses the verdict: she tried, and now she knows.
That's the heart of this post, and it reaches well past patios: trying is how we find out what we love – food, rest, drawing, a life. The Creative Process describes creating as a living dance between heart and mind, and a dance is learned exactly this way: crooked, lopsided, with joy, and never to prove anything. You don't have to be talented to live.
Children know this. She's re-learning it out loud – cat emoji and all.
🐱 Permission to simply try
An idea suddenly came to me – to redo the barbecue spot by the house.
All week I picked out tiles, measured sizes, planned, ordered a table, chairs…
And when everything was almost ready – all that was left was buying the tiles and laying them –
I suddenly realized that… I don't want to.
First, the house is rented – I don't feel like investing much in it.
Second, I simply decided this money could go toward something else right now.
On one hand you could think: “Wasted the time,” “dropped what you started,” “why didn't you think of it earlier”… But no.
I tried – and understood it wasn't needed. And it seems to me the whole of life works this way.
How do we find out what we love to eat,
where to rest, what to watch, read, feel, if we don't try?
Yes, the mind will whisper:
“You won't manage,” “you're not an artist,” “you're not a musician.”
But if I enjoy drawing –
why can't I do it just for myself? Crooked, lopsided, nothing like the greats.
But with joy.
We aren't obliged to be Leonardo da Vinci. We don't have to be talented just to live.
Children, when they create,
don't think: “What will others say?”,
“What if it doesn't work out?”, “I'm not good enough.”
They simply try. With interest.
With curiosity. With faith in themselves.
So why do we, the grown-ups, stop?
I give myself permission to try.
Permission to be funny.
Clumsy. Silly. Untalented.
I give myself permission to be myself.
And simply – to try. 🌸
Thank you for reading.
If her words reached somewhere mine don't – good. That's what this blog is for. Take what fits and leave the rest.
– Jan