Every day we have seemingly small or insignificant events that happen but if we slow down enough then we see that they offer huge growth and learning. A perfect example of this would be my 12 year old daughter who just graduated 6th grade. She ended her school year with almost straight A’s but was hung up on her math grade that was a C. Instead of being proud of herself for her A’s, she was stuck on that one C. But isn’t this what we would all do? Focus on the weakness and be mad at it until we made it an A?
I sat down with her and asked her how she felt about her classes that she passed with A’s. She loved them or at least enjoyed them and didn’t mind the struggle to understand the new topics they offered. But what about her C? It was in math and I can 100% relate to having a C in math. She informed me that she didn’t like the class because she does’t like math at all. It doesn’t come natural to her in the least. We discussed the things that DO come natural to her. Writing, music, art etc. The things that don’t come natural to her are math and some science. So we can fully understand that she is stronger on the right side of her brain than she is the left, that’s science, but what we do next as humans is silly. We focus on how to make our left side/ weaker side stronger instead of focussing on how to strengthen and improve our natural strengths.
Do you see how wasteful that is? We are wasting time and energy every day trying to strengthen our natural weakness instead of focussing on what comes natural and how we can improve that. Think about something that you’re naturally good at, passionate about or interested in and then imagine for a moment what your life would look like if you put more time and attention on those things. Let’s imagine what our life would look like if we stopped trying to make other peoples strengths our own strengths. Every single weakness you have, is someone else straight and some of your strengths are actually other peoples weaknesses. This is how we all live an authentic and unique life. If everyone had zero weaknesses or we all had the same strengths, would’t we be the same with no room for life to happen?
I think it’s time we start rewiring our brain to hear the word “weakness” and not immediately think that makes us less than or un worthy. Can we hear weakness and know that it’s just a part of our self that is smaller in order to make more space for things that are much more important to us? Our weaknesses are wonderful place holders to keep us grounded and balanced while allowing our strengths to call on us for more attention. Your strengths are what your purpose is tied to. Your strengths are what can lead you to a natural flow of your own. Im not good at math. I don’t see numbers the way my husband does. I do not see geometry easily like he does, in fact its almost hilarious to us how my brain doesn’t compete it in the least. I am however insanely creative, intuitive and optimistic. I am musically inclined, an amazing natural dancer, a writer, speaker, visionary who makes one small idea into a huge reality. I don’t get caught up on the fact that parallel parking is a struggle because I don’t see the lines in my head that my husband sees them, but I can be grateful that he will always park the car perfectly while I sit int he passenger seat marveling out the window. One of my weaknesses is a straight of his and that allows a beautiful balance in our relationship where I can allow him to step up when I can’t and vice versa.
What are some of your natural strengths?
How are you encouraging or growing them?
What would your life look like if you accepted your weaknesses as good and poured your love, time and attention into your natural strengths?
What are some of your natural weaknesses?
How can you accept them and see them as good instead of bad?
