(Mis)Adventures in Misuse

We humans can be very resourceful. When a job needs doing, we generally find a way to do it, despite a lack of resources

. 

I bet (especially if you are male) you have done one of the following:

-Used a coat hanger to open a locked car.

-Used a butter knife as a screwdriver

-Used super glue to seal a cut.

-Used a shoelace as a belt

Until very recently I did not own an ice scraper for my car. I needed one only once or twice a year. When the need arose, I grabbed a CD case from my car and scraped my windows with that. Works great. 

We can often get away with reinventing objects for various usage, but there are cases in which this is unwise. Anytime health and safety are at stake, we should pause before plunging over the creative cliff.

A few years ago I was painting in a large room with 25' ceilings. I did not have a 25' ladder. I had an 8' scaffolding and a 12' A-frame ladder. I made it work, for a time. I placed the ladder on top of the scaffolding and could reach the highest point from the top of the ladder. As long as I remembered to lock the wheels of the scaffolding, all was well. I only forgot once. That's all it took. As I stood on the top step of the ladder and leaned toward the wall, the scaffolding was pushed away from the wall, proving that Newton's "equal and opposite reaction" thing is not just a good idea, its the law. In the blink of an eye, I had nothing under my feet but 20' of empty air. I had a Wile E. Coyote moment of suspended realization. Then gravity did its cruel work and I plummeted to the tile floor below. 

My wife saw it happen. She had been on the phone, but as she realized what was happening, she ended the call and began another. I think she had her finger on the second "1" of "9-1-1" before I hit the floor. I landed horizontally, like the World Belly Flop Champ. WHUMP. I lay there on the floor silently wishing I could remember how to breathe. 

Sara stood at a distance, like she thought I might explode, finger on the "1", asking "Are you OK?" Finally, I managed to speak. "Uhhnnggg", I said, and rolled over to my back.

"What?", Sara asked, "Are you OK?"

"I," I gasped, "am idiot". 

To her credit, my wife did not remark on this understatement immediately. After a few minutes of me laying there and her checking me over, we realized I had been very lucky. Nothing broken but my pride. Plenty of bruises to remind me of my stupidity for weeks to come.

Bad things can happen when we use substitute the right way for a more convenient way. 

This happens with faith regularly. We think we know what we want out of life, and we cobble together some beliefs, principles, philosophies that we think will get us what we want. When one of our wants goes unfulfilled, we switch to a new belief or perspective. Or maybe we give up on faith altogether and try to "go it alone". All the while our needs for peace, joy, love and hope nag at us beneath the surface like a toothache for which we know no remedy. 

But what if we created for a certain kind of life? What if there is a way to live that will provide us, maybe not with everything we want, but with all that we truly need - peace, joy, love and hope, to name a few?

What if everything else we've tried is just another misadventure in misuse, expecting money, romance, success or knowledge provide something for us they will never be able to provide?

If there is a right way, a best path, that sounds like something worth pursuing.