"Pick Up the End of the String!"

Yah. Right. Lots of times I feel exactly like that, like someone has handed me a task more complicated for the moment than I'm prepared to do. It's not that the task is beyond me, "impossible," but that there are so many little pesky demands being made on me, right now in this moment, that finding and "picking up the end of the string"  is just more than I've got the time, emotional energy, and the attention span to do. The word "exasperation" comes to mind.

When my sister and I were kids at home and in the midst of  "circumstances," I can remember my mom saying, "Tie a knot in your (circumstantial) rope and hang on." I think it was her way of encouraging us to slow down and carefully evaluate our options. Another famous saying that we heard often, "Life by the yard is apt to be hard, but life by the inch is more of cinch."Again, it was her way of encouraging us to "slow the train" to give ourselves opportunity for evaluation and clarity before we "jumped." A good look at any situation at hand sure seems to be the more intelligent response to what can feel like overwhelming circumstances.

As a counselor often working with married couples one of the biggest challenges partners routinely face has to do with communication and problem solving.  When I was a neophyte counselor studying at the University of Denver, two of my mentors were Doctors Howard Markman and Scott Stanley. I remember so vividly their words explaining how one of the greatest confounding contributors to couples conflict is in their failure to really understand the problem they are trying to solve together. Of course that starts with their really working to understand one another, first. Howard and Scott would say, "You can't solve a problem that you really don't yet understand!" 

I remember reading the little booklet, "The Tyranny of The Urgent." Perhaps you've read it too. It's been a while, but one of the things I remember about it's wisdom is in this question: What's really urgent?" Insight is discovered in one's ability effectively prioritize where and how I can best use and focus my obviously limited energies and time. Yes!

So, maybe "picking up the string" isn't what's most important right now. In fact, maybe it's not really important at all given the other stuff going on. It'll just lay there for now; I won't give it another thought (Matthew 6:31-34). Ha. When I think about it that way I realize it's just a stupid little out of place string.

What's your "string" today?

Have a super day...I think I will!