Help! I'm stuck!

All right.  You might not know this about me, but I tend to get stuck.

After living on the farm these past two years, I think I have now found every soft spot and underground spring -- and sometimes obvious marshy places -- on the farm.  And I have a propensity to get the tractor stuck as I am mowing.

I love to mow.  I have no idea why -- but I love mowing.  Hop on the tractor, rev up the engine, turn on the blades, and mindlessly go back and forth over grass that is higher than the "acceptable length" in my eyes and create the most wonderful fragrance in the outdoor world:  fresh cut grass.

Okay....as you are groaning and I am smiling, let me get to the point of my thoughts before you run out to the garage and try to start up your mower in February.

I also love to organize.  One of my winter projects was to clean out files in my file drawers.  I only have two -- so it shouldn't be a hard task, right?  I got together all my tools -- trash bag, new file folders, and organizing tabs and clips and brought out the first huge file of paper and stopped.

Viewing the contents of the file brought back old feelings, situations, and in my mind's eye, I was right back in the old place of my journey that this paper represented.  Let me tell you this:  I got stuck. 

As I was reflecting and reading the file the questions begin to roll:  To toss or not to toss?  THAT is the question!

If I hold onto something that doesn't bring joy, what good does it do me?  What good does it do my spirit and my psyche in this new part of my journey?  Let me tell you -- deciding whether or not to toss those memories was extremely hard!  I had things dating all the way back to foreverland in that file drawer!  All kinds of questions zipped through my brain.  Did tossing the negative things stored in that drawer mean they never happened?  If I kept only the good things and I died and someone else had to go through the drawer would they think I lived a "charmed" life and not get a realistic picture of my struggles?  (Yes, that was one of the things I really thought.)  What would my life look like without certain memories in that drawer? 

As hard as I could, I tried to equate cleaning out the drawer to mowing...and not getting stuck.  I didn't want to get stuck in the bad memories or things that represented mistakes or errors in my journey.  And I realized that if I learned my lesson well, I didn't need to keep a reminder of that time.  The lesson was learned.  I needed to move on and not focus back there on that time I got stuck in the spring that I KNEW was there because I had gotten stuck the last time I rounded that area of the fence line.  I just needed to remember that the underground spring was there -- and avoid getting stuck by rehashing the last time I got stuck.   I needed to recognize when the front wheels started getting wet and stop - and back up -- and go around that area.  Lesson learned.  No need to sink in that hole again. 

Did I need files of memories to not get stuck again?  Nah. 

Realizing that I could avoid getting stuck in that same old thought process, same actions, same rehashing of old times that didn't extend grace to myself or someone else was not helping me in my footing on THIS hill I am climbing; on THIS part of my journey.   So I finally did what I needed to do and cleaned it out.

I left room for new memories -- new files -- good and bad because the cleaning process is usually not a once and done project for me.  I am always finding things I should have "thrown out" but wasn't quite ready.  Now I am ready.  Ready to see the deep grooves in the mud and not go there anymore.  Ready to recognize the rut in my thinking and speech and actions.

Ready to mow, anyone?