It’s a common analogy to compare our life to a journey or path. Maybe this way of looking at life works for some of you. It works for me and I use it all the time. I think about how I could better handle the obstacles in my path, the twists and turns, the uphill stretches. If you get a flat tire does it do any good to yell in frustration at the tire? Nope, you still need to change the tire. If a tree falls in your path standing there staring at the tree doesn’t get you around it and yelling doesn’t move it. Dwelling on our obstacles is not dealing with our obstacles.
I read something the other day that you may have heard before but it was new to me. “The obstacle is the path.” Whoa. I had to think that through for a few moments in order to really get it. It’s so simple but so easy to overlook. We don’t change if we are comfortable. We grow by getting outside our comfort zone. If the path is straight and smooth nothing happens. It’s the obstacles that create opportunities for us.
That sounds great but it isn’t that easy. I continue to struggle with the obstacles, with the gap between how things are and how I’d like them to be, with stress. No matter how many times I write about this, no matter how much I think about it and no matter how many times I deal with an obstacle successfully it just doesn’t stick. I still get stressed or frustrated or upset. I still judge the things that come up instead of just dealing with them. I still feel the pain of that gap between what I want and what really is.
I learned how to tie my shoes when I was a kid and I can still do it every time I try. I learned how to ride a bike way back then too and I still just hop onto a bike and ride. I don’t sometimes forget how to pedal the bike or how to make a bow knot. But I’m not learning how to smoothly deal with obstacles. Sometimes I get it, sometimes I don’t.
Even fun things can make me feel frustrated. I was playing tennis the other day. At first I was doing well but as my opponent warmed up and got into his groove it became harder for me to continue to do as well. I needed to play better too and I wasn’t. We were talking about it as we were playing and I told him that I didn’t even care if I won. It’s more of a competition against myself. If I’m making my shots or coming close then I’ll feel good about it even if I lose. That wasn’t just talk, that’s really how I feel. It was a Sunday morning. We were outside on a beautiful day, hanging out, playing a game, having fun, getting exercise. It was great. But I still felt a little bad afterwards. I knew what was happening. I knew that I was feeling frustrated about how I was playing. I knew that that was foolish and that it shouldn’t matter but I still felt bad about feeling bad or not hitting better shots or something.
I’m finding that a lot of this is about control. The two things that cause me the most stress and frustrate me the most are dealing with my kids and dealing with things at work. In both of those situations I really have no control. If someone cuts me off in traffic and it annoys me I could pass them or turn and go a different way. Even though I can’t control how that person is driving I have choices about how to affect the outcome. But with my kids or at work I really have no control and I can’t get off the ride. I love my kids even when they’re misbehaving or not following directions so I’m stuck. And I’ve gotten used to and kind of like having a house to live in and food to eat so I really need to keep working to make money so I’m stuck there too.
So let’s recap. I really don’t care if I win when I play games. I just play for fun and to challenge myself but I still feel frustrated. I do see this life as a journey and know that it is full of obstacles but still feel frustrated by those obstacles. I know that I can not control people or circumstances but still feel frustrated by my kids and by things that happen at work. There is a large gap between what I am understanding intellectually and how I am feeling and reacting to the things that happen. It isn’t easy to close that gap. Sometimes I feel like I’m getting better at smoothly handling the things that come up in life but that smoothness doesn’t last. I always end up smashing into another obstacle instead of calmly navigating through it or around it.
I need to add another thing to the list of things I can’t control. I can’t control how I feel or respond to all these things that happen in life. Maybe it’s that simple. Maybe it doesn’t matter if I feel frustrated, maybe it matters what happens next. That could be the last little realization to make this whole process of dealing with obstacles work better. Accepting that not only do I not have control over any of these obstacles, but I don’t even have control over my own reactions. My reactions to these obstacles are just another layer of the obstacle. After my initial reaction then I can choose not to give into that reaction and just let it go and deal with what lies before me. Instead of being frustrated by my frustration, I could not respond to my frustration. Just recognize that I had that reaction, let it go instead of holding onto it and continue to navigate the obstacle without the baggage of my initial reaction.