I Can't Do It All At Once

"I can't do it all at once", that is the title to a Kenneth Cope song.  One of my all time favorite songs.  It speaks to me.  I seem to go at two speeds, full force forward and comatose.  Berry Blurbs posted recently on how most  people resist large changes.  I am no different.

I look back on the last several decades and sometimes I don't see much.  It is the patterns of behavior that I see that have of late disheartened me.  Like either taking on too much or becoming a sluggard.  There has to be a happy middle ground.  I can relate to the feeling Nephi had of himself.  Perhaps we all look too harshly (and sometimes too leniently) at ourselves.  (Maybe all sin comes at the extremes of behavior)

In 2009, I referred to a talk be Jorge Zeballos.

Immediately after teaching that “it is not requisite that a man should run faster than he has strength,” King Benjamin indicated that “it is expedient that he should be diligent, that thereby he might win the prize." (Jorge F. Zeballos, “Attempting the Impossible,” Ensign, Nov 2009, 33–34)

This seems to teach a perfect balance.  Do not run too fast, but be diligent.  Papa D wrote yesterday a very good post on balance.

All these things make me think of the time I decided to teach myself to tie my shoes differently.  I had always made the first cross knot by putting the right string over the left.  I then proceeded to tie with the loop starting in the right hand.  This produces an adequate knot.  I learned from my wife many years ago that it also is not as pretty and balanced.  When I would tie a ribbon around one of my daughter's waist in the same way I tied my shoes, it produced a knot that leans one way.

So I decided to change how I tie my shoes, partly so it would be more automatic for me when I tied my daughter's bows.  More so, I wanted to practice changing.  In the spirit of this post, I wanted to just change one little thing.  So I started tying my shoes by putting the left string over the right.  Then I continued as I did before with the loop in the right hand.  I now tie a much more balanced knot and my daughters have prettier bows (though I am sure I can further improve my technique).

Anyway, here is to a late, not new years resolution.  To change a few things in my life, just a few, maybe I will start with one.  I haven't decided what it is yet, but I commit to change even a little for the better.  To be diligent as King Benjamin suggested but not at a pace that winds me too much.