A New Way of Doing Something

Yesterday I took the afternoon to head into the city to spend a couple of hours with Terri. Being confined to the hospital, Terri has been trying to fill her time as best she can. She has done a couple of cross stitches, done some sketches, and spends some time watching TV. She decided that she really wanted to try her hand at crocheting again but it has been a very long time and she really never mastered anything more than a chain. This is where I come in. My task was to pick up the necessary stuff and teach her. Well I did just that.

We decided to start with something basic and try to crochet some dish clothes. Seated in her room I proceeded to show her the basic chain stitch and then a single and a double stitch. It didn’t take long for us to realize that this was not going to work. You see, Terri is left handed and I am not! I would show her the stitch and then she would try to convert it to left handed but it was proving to be very difficult.

Now some might suggest that we simply google left handed crocheting and watch a video. Perfect solution. Not! Internet at the hospital is very slow and most times won’t let you do something like streaming. So this was even more frustrating. The only obvious solution was for me to switch hands and figure it out. So first I needed to teach myself to use the left hand and then teach Terri. It was indeed a journey!!!

As I thought about this on the way home I was struck by how much concentration it takes to learn someone else’s way of doing things and it is not easy! Yet in order for me to communicate, what I needed to this is what was required. I began to think about how this really was a life lesson.

How often do we try to communicate something and the other person just can’t get it? Perhaps it is because we are not using the language that they understand, or presenting in a way that their brain can’t comprehend. Perhaps we are showing it right handed and all they can use is the left. So often we take the approach that we said it or did it and it is the other person’s responsibility to figure it.

Maybe what is needed is taking the time to learn a different way and then share. It is kind of like taking a moment to walk in the other person’s shoes, or see through their eyes. This not only enables us to share what we want but also opens up the possibilities for our own learning and growing and changing. By simply switching hands I changed direction, learned a new way of doing something, and discovered that there are many ways to arrive at the same destination.

Blessings
Valerie