When have you ever seen someone jump out of a 6 foot hole? I seem to be saying this a lot this year. Okay, and I am not talking about your freakish friend who can do a massive box jump. The answer is you don't. You don't see someone jump out of a six foot hole. You see them climb out of it.
Why does this matter? Well I think because when we are going through something hard...when we find ourselves in a hole...we want to jump out of it. We want to fix it and for it to all just be over.. WE WANT OUT. But....that's just not how it works.
So what does this mean? It means that when we are faced with tough times there are first a couple of steps to getting out of the hole that I think are really hard.
The first is you have to accept you are in a hole
The second is you have to accept that you are not jumping out of it
Accept you are in a hole you say? I promise it’s not the same as admitting defeat. It’s having the self awareness to know where you are. It’s hard to climb out of the hole if you wont accept you are in it. It’s being realistic. It’s being self-aware. It’s knowing what ground you are standing on SO you can start to climb. You can't start to climb until you accept though.
Then it’s finding your first hand hold or foot hold. It’s knowing that you are going to have a lot of steps to getting out of the hole and that you are not going to see daylight immediately. It’s honoring and respecting how important each hand hold and foot hold are EVEN THOUGH you don't want to be there. Without them you just fall back into the hole.
So what is this hole we speak of? It’s any obstacle, set back, slump, struggle, start of any process. And it takes discipline to both recognize it and settle on a hand hold or foothold and not try to keep jumping.
One thing that is always amazing to see in land navigation is that it’s taking it a step at a time. You can’t get to your second or third point until you find your first. It’s accepting that you have to walk each step and there really isn't a short cut. When you get lost it's deciding what the first hand hold or foot hold is. YOU have to fix it.