Life’s journey is never a clear one for us. Our attention is so distracted that it is difficult for us to dream about the end while executing on what needs to be done today. Our life’s journey resembles more of a puzzle than a highway.
What I find fascinating is just how much intentional thought, habitual discipline, and determined heart is needed to reach a major goal or milestone in our lives that will make us proud.
Becoming aware that our lives are more of a puzzle than we would have ever thought is revealing. That many pieces have to fit in order to move forward.
Rarely does one thing take us all of the way. Our infectious laugh weakens when we don’t have the knowledge to do what we set out to do. The effect of walking every day gets trampled on by the excesses of our diet. What we don’t know is never discovered by the people we are around and have known.
Understanding that our life mimics puzzles can be powerful. That lot’s of little choices are needed to begin to create a coherent whole to our lives that have meaning and purpose. That the picture never readily gets formed but takes time and patience in the same way that a puzzle comes to life after hours of concentration.
Where life diverges from puzzles is that each of us can mold the ends of a puzzle piece to fit together with the next piece we need to bring into our lives. Some connections are easy. Others very difficult. Either because we don’t see them or we never seem to find a way to connect them. Our individuality brings us the capacity to do this in our own special way.
Working on puzzles is old school. Hard to imagine we would be interested in doing one given the temptations that our smartphones bring to us today.
Working on our lives is “all” school. It’s great for both young and old. The first step to making progress, on this front, is to understand that you are working on a large puzzle.
It’s never too late to start. We have more pieces to work with than we think. Seeing how they fit together is the hard part. Moving towards a complete picture is our goal. One that we thought could only be a dream.