Life's mathematics

In elementary school, I remember each year when they handed out new math books- I would quick flip to the back of the book and look at the problems in the very last chapter.  Each time I remember thinking, no way.  There is NO WAY  I'm going to be able to do those problems ever.  Those make zero sense!  And the year I flipped the pages to the back of the book and there were letters mixed in with the numbers I about lost my mind.  I thought everyone had lost their minds.  It made no sense given what I had learned so far. 

That's the funny thing about learning.  You think you have it all figured out.  And then there's more and you have to either figure out how it connects to what you already know or pull everything back apart and figure out where you went wrong in order to make sense of it all. 

Of course, this applies to mathematics, but it also to so much more.  With the world full of chaos right now, (and not just because of coronavirus, though this certainly applies) and we come face to face or face to screen in many cases... with ideas and people and information that doesn't seem to make sense, or they directly oppose yours- here is where the opportunity lies.  Remember that often we are peeking into the back of the math book.  Just because something doesn't make sense doesn't mean it's crazy talk.  (Although, sometimes it IS!)  But likely, it's because we are at differing levels of understanding, different levels of life's math. 

Remember when your teacher would have you come to the board to solve one of those big long equations in front of the whole class?  There was so much pressure to get it right.  Remember when you would miss a step and people would start to snicker?  I hated it.  I would feel the redness in my neck start, and my tears would come right to the surface, making it even harder to focus on what came next. 

If you were lucky, you had a lovely soul of a math teacher who kindly helped you deconstruct your work until you found the place you made a wrong turn. 

I actually wrote this post a few months ago on scraps of paper, decided I didn't like it and tucked it away in the pages of a book.  When I opened that book and found them, I thought how grateful I was to me for jotting them down. 

I am riddled with weakness.  Mistakes fly from me a LOT.  I often flip to the back of the book and look at others who are far beyond me in learning and growing.  I feel overwhelmed that I don't understand what they do, that I am not as good at something as they might be.  But I am learning to learn at the level I am at and just take a page at a time.  I am so sorry to my darling sister who was at the receiving end of some of my weakness this week.  I love you dearly.   

Her Hands