Getting it right

Rules. Rules have long been my thing.

But recently things are coming untangled.

I feel freer. Not sure how it necessarily makes a difference in my life. Like how do I DO differently.

But maybe the more I talk about it the sooner I will work it out.

So it started, 3 years ago.

Sitting in the lounge. Paralysed in freeze. Unable to do my to-do list.

Realising that in that moment I felt this obsession to do things ‘right; I had to find the most efficient way to do my chores which meant not taking unnecessary trips up and down the stairs in my house.

And because I had not figured that out. Then I couldn’t do anything. So there I was. Sitting on the settee.

Then I realised in the moment how rules, ruled my life. How this rule of ‘being efficient’ was controlling my life.

So from then I started to tell myself that it was ok to not do things efficiently so long as I was moving things forward. I started to examine how rules ruled my life.

Fast forward to now.

I was chatting with a friend and he summarised:

"At any one time we make a decision based on what is available to us at that time. The challenge is being confident that this decision will happen and become the past.

Ultimate we are learning and growing to more accurately control our pointer and we navigate differently as we learn and grow, not better or worse because the past is done. Therefore the excitement should be in being open, precious of time and love and also learning with a direction not a goal and not to fill space."

MIND BLOWN.

This felt freeing. This felt like each decision didn’t need to have this huge weight on it.

Then in sharing this with another friend she reflected back:

“There is no shame in the decisions we make, with what we have in those moments”

SMACK IN THE FACE.

Shame. This sense of needing to get it right. Be right. Get it perfect.

But even deeper that this shame comes from assessing the ‘rightness’ of a decision against information that comes afterwards. That’s a very unfair way to judge my decisions.

The information afterwards is simply information which should feed into making the next decision. It can’t be used to judge the old decision.

So you may ask how does one assess what is good if one does not assess what was wrong before.

Well there is an assessment but it’s different. It’s arms length. There is space from it. The aim is to learn not to shame, judge and belittle.

I have yet to figure out how to apply this in my life. But I know there is a different level of freedom on the other side.

And I am walking determinedly towards it.

End note: The echo in my brain is “you can’t do that”.