Meeting Life’s Challenges
Last fall my spouse and I planted some spring flowering bulbs. The ordered 1000 daffodils had arrived– each requiring a 6-8 inch deep hole – hand dug with a shovel.
Thursday morning, our first planting day, I set out to do my share. The sharpshooter shovel bit nicely into the slightly damp loam. The bulbs slid into the ground one by one until the first 100 were planted.
In the afternoon, I moved to a new area – next to some trees, in the sun. The dirt was dry all the way down, the poison ivy, tree and bush roots reared up each time I stomped on the shovel. The dirt crumbled into the hole, causing me to need to dig out the dirt instead of being able to shove it aside. Each bulb took three times as long to plant as the ones I planted that morning.
Meanwhile, my spouse was digging in another area, speedily and easily sliding the bulbs into their 6” deep holes.
As I struggled to dig that afternoon, I reflected on how some folks have a much easier time of it in life than others. Some people are ill equipped, or unprepared to deal with what life hands out and have to struggle three times as hard as others to get to the same result.
However, by experiencing that struggle, I re-discovered the satisfaction of overcoming a challenge to achieve a goal.
As parents, we want our children to have an easy row to hoe – so they can accomplish great things. We do our best to educate, train and prepare them to meet life’s challenges.
What we sometimes forget is that we should also give them the opportunity to experience and overcome challenges – even though it may cause them pain and frustration in the short term.
