For the first 50 years of my life, my perfectionist self mistakenly believed it was all about knowing more, getting it right, planning, attempting to prevent bad things from happening, and keeping all of my chicks in a row. It took me this long to discover that the JOURNEY is all that matters. This quote from Gilda Radner sums it all up:

"I wanted a perfect ending. Now I've learned, the hard way, that some poems don't rhyme, and some stories don't have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next.
"


Thursday, September 13, 2012

Lessons from a Squirrel

When I think about writing a new blog post, I usually have a general idea of what I want to say then I do a little research online for quotes or information that will support or contribute to the topic in some way.  I actually end up learning a few things in the process.

Today I knew what I wanted to write about.

Squirrels.



In particular, the hundreds of squirrels that have run in front of my car
in the past few weeks.
EVERY time I drive anywhere, it happens.

They sit on the side of the road and wait until the last minute
to dart across in front of me.

OR, they stop in the middle of the road long enough to make eye contact - causing me to swerve my car to avoid them.  The only problem is, they don't always continue across where I expect them to go!
Sometimes they deliberately go back in the direction I have gone to avoid them!

I swear I saw a squirrel yesterday carrying something - and it wasn't a nut!
Probably trying to capture the look on my face to publish in some squirrel newpaper!

But seriously,  in my research forced me to think deeper about squirrels
and what we can learn from.

1)  The squirrel only actually finds 10% of the nuts he hides for safekeeping.

      I know that I am guilty of over-preparing sometimes.  I try to think of all
      of the possible things that can happen and cover for them.  A lot of time
      and money is wasted preparing for things that never actually happen. 

2)  I wish I had the guts to just sprint to where I want to go,
     taking risks more readily,
     leaping from branch to branch without a care about falling.

3)  Sometimes you can't sprint to the finish line.  Often you cannot rush things. 
     Some things just take time.  No matter how much you want them to happen faster
     or how much you try.

and lastly

4)  Often the squirrel is almost across the road, but when scared by an oncoming car
     turns around retreats back to where he came from.  Isn't this true of us too? 
     We often get scared or let minor setbacks stop us from doing something,
     when in fact we were closer to our goal than we thought.

In my research, I never actually found out why squirrels are darting in front of my car
so much this year.  If anyone knows, please tell me.  I don't remember them being so
active ever before. 

Does it have to do with the weather? 

Does it say something about the upcoming winter?

Or since last winter was so mild,  are there just more squirrels this year?

I wish I knew.

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