Well, I get to go again.

I have joined the local knitting club, which meets weekly at the public library. I have been attending for about a year. Recently I finished a sweater for myself. I started with a tea cozy, then a couple of hats.

My son came into some lovely dark grey yarn, and thought he might like to have a cable knit sweater made out of it. Cables are a bit above my pay grade. So, my option is to say no can do…way too hard, and shrink in fear and self doubt.

Or, I can do it anyway. Growth happens in discomfort. Don’t let fear have a deciding voice and all the other things I have told myself over the years.

I get to tell myself that again. One of my fellow knitting club knitters, who can knit and read at the same time (what?!) found me a pattern for Kyle’s sweater.

Her first words when she gave me the pattern were, “don’t be daunted by the pattern. I can help you if you need it!!”

And then I looked at the pattern.  It is 5 pages long! It might take me the rest of my life to finish this sweater!

However, I do have a very experienced, patient, willing expert to help me. Not if I have trouble. WHEN I have trouble.

I am reminded of my martial arts training all those years ago. The instructor competed internationally and won. And he would show us what we were going to learn that day. Executed with perfection, his demonstration was something to behold. And I would think to myself, I’m a widowed housewife with three kids whose worst mark in school was phys-ed. I don’t think I can do that.

And then the instructor broke the move down for us into small sections, which we would practice. After each section was practiced and done reasonably well, we would put everything together and do the whole move. I did it! It looked nothing like how the instructor did it, but I also wasn’t expecting to sign up for an international competition after a 1-hour lesson either.

Choosing my Thoughts

That lesson has been life changing for me. Start at the beginning, do one piece at a time, and it will all come together.

Perhaps that will be true of this sweater as well.

Stay in the moment.

What I focus on expands.

I am focusing on completing the sweater and having it be fabulous.

And the battle begins. Somewhere along the line, the voice of my parents saying, “you can’t do that!” became my own voice. But believing that felt small and awful. I knew that I was more than I had become.

I don’t know where terrible, “not-enough” thoughts come from. But I have learned that I don’t have to dwell on them. Or agree with them.

Many years ago, I happened upon a picture that I used for the background on my computer for a long time. It simply said, “the voice in your head that says you can’t do this is a liar”.

Brilliant!

I can choose to think something else.

I know this is just a sweater. But there are so many lessons I can learn.

It is too hard for me to do on my own. So I will need to humble myself and ask for help, which has never been one of my best traits.

When I am the student, I appreciate the strength, patience and kindness of the instructor. I hope that being the student will help make me a patient, compassionate instructor when it is my time to help someone else.

I hope that doing something outside my comfort zone, even though it is just knitting a sweater, will help me to be a better student and a better teacher.

And that Kyle will actually be able to wear the sweater.