Don't stretch your arm out....

Hello there how are you?

Last week I told you a story about my daughter’s grazed arm and this week I am continuing with my learning from that incident, are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin....

That evening, once we were back home safely and the girls were tucked up in bed, I was giving my youngest daughter her goodnight cuddles and she said "Ooh mummy my cut elbow hurts when I stretch my arm out." And she demonstrated by stretching her arm out and wincing.   Bless her. My response was to say "Well, don't stretch your arm out then."

And I got an immediate flashback to being a girl myself. One of the things I always remember about my Dad was that if I said to him "doing this hurts" or "when I do this I don't like it" his response would always be "well, don't do that then." 

Do you know, it used to really annoy me when he said it to me. I can remember thinking to myself "well that's a silly answer, as if I can just stop doing that." 

And that night with my daughter, I realised how wise my lovely Dad had actually been. We spend our lives repeating patterns over and over, patterns that we know deep down aren't good for us, and patterns that we know deep down will hurt us. And yet we persist. 

The truth is, if you know that doing something is going to hurt then you can absolutely stop yourself from doing it. Breaking those patterns is utterly within your control.

Don't purposely put yourself in harm's way, if it hurts when you stretch your arm out, then don't stretch your arm out.

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