It was Sunday, the day I nap. I was in that half-awake, half-asleep moment when I heard a desperate scream. Rolling over, I tried to crawl back into my dream but shot awake when the scream suddenly became clear and familiar!
Racing through the house, I followed the wild cries of my seven-year-old son.
“Help me! Help! Mom! MOM!!”
I found him, but all I could see was one terrified, tear-filled blue eye and the tips of his dirty fingers. He was reaching with all his might through a tiny slot from inside my desk. He was trapped.
The desk is huge and old and solid wood and at one point in its life it housed a sewing machine. A section on the top lifts up revealing a wooden boxed cavity where a sewing machine once lived. My curious boy had lifted the lid and somehow slid into the box trapping himself with his own weight.
The harder he fought to get out, the more impossible and frenzied it became.
I held his tiny fingers and locked eyes with his tear-filled and terrified blue eye. We slowed and breathed and surrendered. Then I lifted the lid and set him free. He was red-faced and sweaty but felt the relief of freedom.
There are times I trap myself, too. Maybe the trap is how we compare ourselves to others, fear, ego or plain old laziness. Maybe we’ve given up or we’re scrambling to keep up or maybe we’re worried about what our family thinks. Or maybe it’s something else.
So, what’s trapping you? What’s in your way?
Make a list of things in your way; a mental list, a list on your phone, in your journal or on the back of a receipt, anywhere.
Review your list and delete anything that has to do with or blames someone else. Be raw. Be real. Be genuine with yourself.
Now look at what’s left on your list? What stands out? What do you want to do with it?
And…I don’t think life is always about what we do or accomplish, especially when things feel impossible or frenzied. Sometimes it’s about resting, surrendering or observing. You see, just like my boy, I surrendered before getting out of my trap.