The Long, Slow Climb

There are days when it's hard for me to find inspiration and come up with a good idea for my weekly blog post.

Sometimes I just have to sit for a few minutes and let everything around me go quiet until the thoughts in my brain can settle.

This week was one of those weeks.

My brain just couldn't seem to slow down.

I forced myself to sit in the silence for a moment.

Closed my eyes and took a few deep breaths.

Then I opened my laptop and started looking at photos I have taken.

I save pictures in a specific album for my blog. They capture everyday moments that I think might tell a good story, or remind me of a lesson I want to share.

When I came across this one of the caterpillar on my fence last fall, it called to me.

I remember pausing as I was mowing the lawn and running to grab my phone to snap a picture of it.

The fence is probably 6 feet high and this caterpillar was nearly at the top of it.

I thought about the long, slow climb the caterpillar would have had to make from the ground to the top of that fence.

I wondered how many hours it had been on that journey.

And I wondered where it was headed from there.

Was it going over the fence to the other side? Was it just moseying along enjoying the view with no particular destination?

I went back to check on the caterpillar's progress later that night, but it was gone.

I haven't seen it since then and I'll probably never know where it ended up.

But it made me pause that day. It reminded me that sometimes it's okay to slow down.

When our brains are too full and our hearts too heavy, the best thing we can do is just stop.

Stop rushing.

Stop thinking so hard.

Stop worrying.

Stop hustling.

And then start moving again, but slowly.

Slowly enough to see and appreciate the world around us. The tiny, ordinary moments that make up one big extraordinary life.

Sometimes that long, slow climb is exactly what we're meant to be doing.

I think we should take a lesson from that caterpillar.

One way or another we're going to get to the top of that fence.

We can choose to rush through life, consumed by a million "urgent" tasks and distractions.

Or we can choose to slow down and enjoy the journey.

Let's choose wisely.

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