At the beginning of our school year, my little six year old
sat weeping in the car on the way to school.
“I don’t want to do my spelling test today.”
“What if I get my
words wrong?”
Fast forward two months later, and there I sat cross-legged
on a mat at ZOE facing a ZOE mum who was encouraging me to answer the question
she’d just asked me in Thai. “Just have
a go,” she gently prompted but the only words that came out of my mouth were
the English-kind, “I can’t. What if I
get it wrong?”
There was a certain amount of hopelessness that I felt in
the pit of my stomach that day. Not just
for me, but also for the mother-in-me
who doesn’t quite know how to get it together enough to help her child to let
go of the “perfect-or-nothing” mantra either.
That day as we drove home, I had to make a decision.
Going forward… Change must come.
And so I asked myself:
Was I prepared to fail in order to succeed?
Was I ready to break off the chains that held me back so
many times?
Would I make a change, if not for myself, but for my
children whose little eyes watch my every move?
On the inside I wept. I was so sorry for all the time I’d wasted holding
back due to my own crippling insecurities.
I was sorry about the neighbours who I never really got to know because… what if I
said something wrong?
I was sorry about the people cooking food on the side of the
street that I feared would laugh at me for saying the wrong classifier when I
ordered.
I was sorry about the hairdresser who wanted to engage in
conversation but instead I hoped they’d just think I was a tourist…
The list goes on.
In the end, there was no point feeling sorry any longer. I
needed action.
The last few weeks have been hard. Not in the sense of going through hardship.
But I have been chipping away at my Thai language studies
just about every day. With my formal
classes at a language school mixed with a casual teacher who comes with me to do
‘day-to-day’ tasks a few times per week, I am … very
slowly (and I mean VERY slowly) learning and building confidence.
Mentally, I feel exhausted.
Most times I have words swimming around in my head that I don’t even
know what they mean, only that at some point that day I had learnt to say them…
and I have been known to ask my teacher, “What did I just
say to you?”
What’s been the biggest shift though is that I am beginning
to laugh at myself more and loosen up just-a-bit. This week with my teacher at home, we have
been laughing so hard my cheeks hurt as she has been teaching me some new
vocabulary.
But actually, it’s felt okay - even when I’ve got it wrong.
It’s small, baby steps forward and I will fall down. But I am determined, to get up and try
again.
I’m hoping that if there’s something holding you back this
week that you too will be able to find just enough courage and strength to take
that baby step toward your goal.
Andie
