One of the readers of this website inspired the topic for this month’s newsletter. She wrote during the first week of the year, “I enjoy the website and I always enjoy reading how you approach every day of your life. I certainly enjoy life, but I flit too much and must react and respond to situations when I would like to have more control over them.”

I answered the correspondent by applauding her desire to act so she would not have to spend so much time reacting and suggested that the way I approach making changes is one small step at a time.

A few days later she wrote again: I started off on my being proactive today! Procrastination is a big problem. Put off what you can…So I get ready to jump out of the truck this morning and an empty Diet Coke can flips out of the drink holder. Instead of just putting it back, I said, ‘No, take it inside and put it in the soda can container instead of leaving it in your truck to throw away or fall out later.’ Now, I realize that this was a baby step, but at least I had the thought in my mind!”

Then came these words in a third email: “I believe that I’ve always discounted baby steps in regards to getting things done around the house, projects, weight loss, saving money, etc. 2004 will be the year of the baby steps! Actually, I’ve already cleaned up a 1′x1′ square place on my desk this morning! I will not fixate on how much more area there is to finish straightening my entire office.”

Smart woman! Making major changes one simple act at a time.

Clear hill one lie-down at a time

I was reminded when I received these emails of an ancient story from Egypt that I told in one of the books I wrote, A Sacred Primer. The story goes like this: A man had a plot of land. And through his carelessness brambles sprang up and it became a wilderness of thistles and thorns. Then he decided to cultivate it. So he said to his son: “Go and clear that ground.” So the son went to clear it, and saw that the thistles and thorns had multiplied…. He said: “How much time shall I need to clear and weed all this?” And he lay on the ground and went to sleep. He did this day after day. Later his father came to see what he had done, and found him doing nothing. When his father asked him about it, the son replied that the job looked so hard that he could never make himself begin. His father replied, “Son, if you had cleared each day the area on which you lay down, your work would have advanced slowly and you would not have lost heart.” So the lad did what his father said, and in a short time the plot was cultivated.

When Jerele and I lived in London, we learned a new way of talking about taking a rest. When someone was tired, she or he would say: “I’m going to take a lie-down.” So I got in the habit of saying when someone called while I was resting on the couch, “Oh, I was just having a little lie-down.”

	Books waiting to be organized

That is what the son was doing in the story, wasn’t it? Just taking a little lie-down instead of clearing the land. And the father offered the brilliant advice: just clear the amount of space it takes to lie down and you will be in action. As the days go by, you will have cleared all the land.

I’ve been thinking about organizing my books which are scattered helter-skelter in four different rooms. But instead of trying to do this all at once, I believe the approach I will take is to tackle this task “one lie-down at a time.”

Have a great and proactive February!

Dr. Elizabeth Harper Neeld offers wisdom and practical insights to anyone whose life is in a time of transition, change, grief and loss of any kind. As an internationally recognized and accomplished consultant, and author of more than twenty books - including Tough Transitions and Seven Choices: Finding Daylight After Loss Shatters Your World - she is committed to work that helps lift the human spirit.