Be the blacksmith
Son,
We have talked about a lot of things here but I wanted to
touch on something that I feel is important to say. Be the blacksmith of your
life.
I have recently begun doing some blacksmith work. By all
metrics I am very much a novice, but there is an interesting fact to it that
has carry over to life.
To do his work, a blacksmith heats his steel to the right temperature,
then works it into the shape he wants it to be. If you try to work it too cold,
things just wont move. If you work it too hot things simply do not hold
together the same way as they need to. The real key is that there must be heat for you
to mold it the way you have in mind. Life is like that, your body is like that,
your career, school, many things are in some way like that.
Friction causes heat. Life will give you things that you can see as challenges. You lose your job, the person you want to be with doesn’t want to be with you, you wreck your car, it does not matter the specifics, you are handed something that on its surface looks like a red-hot pile of… steel. At this point you have 2 choices, work it, mold it into a win, or something you want, or let it cool and have a cold pile of… steel. Your body is that way. To make it into something you want it to be you must work it, use it, do things with it that make it what you want. You heat it up, and put it through processes that make that happen.
Friction causes heat. Life will give you things that you can see as challenges. You lose your job, the person you want to be with doesn’t want to be with you, you wreck your car, it does not matter the specifics, you are handed something that on its surface looks like a red-hot pile of… steel. At this point you have 2 choices, work it, mold it into a win, or something you want, or let it cool and have a cold pile of… steel. Your body is that way. To make it into something you want it to be you must work it, use it, do things with it that make it what you want. You heat it up, and put it through processes that make that happen.
In the last 5 years I have lost my job 2 times. The first
was a result of my own actions paired with the actions of my management. (When
it feels like someone is out to get you professionally whether they are or not,
get out, you will be much happier someplace where they support you.) One was a
result of simply not having enough business and the branch closing. Without
that kick in the butt, I would not have landed where I did, and I am much happier
here. Life will give you heat; you decide what to do with it. If you do nothing, you have wasted that heat.
That is not to say that all of life’s heat has to move you. Sometimes
you heat something up to do some cleaning up of the work, or to normalize and
even out the heat. Just because you have a fight with a person you love does
not mean you have to leave them, but it is a time of choice, what will I do
with this heat? Will I smooth things out and make them what I want them to be?
Will I put it on the anvil of life and then go get a drink, go to the bathroom,
and be upset when I come back and things are not the way I want them to be?
The things you do are the anvil. They are benign, just
sitting there. You get to choose how to use that to make it what you want. That
is your hammers.
Be the Blacksmith of your life, forge it the way you want
it. If you are unhappy with something do what you can to change it. There is
not always a big timer in the sky that says you must do X by Y time. If you
work it and are not satisfied with your results, keep working it. If you have
to move a deadline, do so, it is better to be satisfied with your work, then to
allow something that is important to be sub-par because it was rushed. Take your
time for the things you really want, and make them happen.
