As saying goes: ‘Don’t sweat the small stuff’

Published 10:31 am Thursday, January 25, 2018

saw a quote once that inspired me. It said, “We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.”

It made me stop and think, could that actually be true?

You will see a theme from time to time in my columns. I tend to surround myself with quotes and other forms of writing to serve as inspiration in life.

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I mean, imagine me doing that, I am a writer after all.

But still, as I meditated on that quote, it made me realize how important it is to let the small stuff go.

So many times, I — and I know a good handful of others — get caught up on the small hurdles in life instead of realizing the path we walk down is, in fact, a masterpiece of lessons. And we are all students attempting to figure out its plan.

Now that thought might be pretty heavy for a weekly newspaper, but I find it important to try and understand, none the less.

For example, my children struggle with this from time to time, as many children do. One in particular, my middle child, beats herself up constantly, almost instinctively, when she feels she has failed.

And in the moment that an 8-year-old is having her meltdown over her latest spelling test or her cheerleading practice, there is nothing any parent can try to say to make it better.

Except for one thing, and that is try your hardest and I am proud of you no matter what.

This week as she tried to explain to me that her teacher must think she is stupid because she has “its” as a spelling word, a word that she knew how to spell in kindergarten, I tried to reason with my emotional daughter that there is no way she is stupid and there has to be a reason which is bigger than she can understand as to why she has the spelling words she does.

When all else failed, I told her my story.

It is a story of how her mommy’s worst subject in school was spelling and grammar. How people would laugh at me because I could never get all the variations of they’re, their, and there right even when I graduated high school. How even through all of that I went on despite my hurdles and pursued my dream of becoming a writer.

I then told her that, some days, I still don’t get it right, and she might not either, but that should never stop her from trying.

This conversation made me think about that quote I read a long time ago.

If we are in fact apprentices in this game of life where no one ever becomes a master, then why do we sweat the small stuff? Why do we let it stop us?

Like the young gentleman at West Jessamine I wrote an article about this week who has done everything in his power to overcome his learning disabilities, he is not letting that stop him, just like I did not let it stop me. And I make sure my daughter knows it should never stop her.

In accepting the fact we might never become masters at our crafts, whatever they may be in life, it gives us the upper hand to learn what we can and keep pushing forward. I hope in time my children accept it as I have and know as long as they try their hardest I am proud of them no matter what.

That, in itself, is a lesson for all of us.

Brittany Fuller is the community editor of The Jessamine Journal and Jessamine Life magazine. She can be reached at brittany.fuller@jessaminejournal.com.