“Fear is only strong when you feed it!” Halcyon MacKnight
Recently something happened in my kitchen that proved the truth of this wonderful quote! It also showed me that even though I am pretty good at facing fear, I still have a long way to go!
Recently we purchased a new electric stove, and from the time it was installed one of the front burners just did not sit right on its spot. It worked all right, but when you placed a pan on it; it was uneven. I called the place of purchase and they sent out a repair person. His first words before he looked at my problem was: “you know they don’t make quality products any more, so there may not be anything I can do for you, as long as it is working!” Quite a trust building moment, wasn’t it?
After working with the burner for a while he concluded that it was working well and I could order a new replacement. However, I would have to pay for it, since it not covered with the warranty. I decided it was minor and we could live with it, so I just ignored the issue.
Now we are not called to cook often on the stove top, (the microwave is our tool of choice); but being gluten-free there are some items that require cooking skills. The other day was one such case. I wanted oatmeal for breakfast and you have to cook it on the stove top -not in the microwave! Here again I was facing this uneven front burner. Sure I could have used another burner, but that wasn’t in my game for the day!
As both my husband and I are not wired for cooking or mechanics, (we have other great gifts), for some odd reason I decided to take one more look at that burner. In looking at the set-up I determined I had never thought of exchanging the back burner coil with my uneven one in the front. Would you have thought of that sooner? So I felt empowered to do that, and guess what? Yes, it solved the problem. Now both burners fit well as they are supposed to, in their correct spots.
I took this test a step further into our business world! How often do we say we are not gifted in certain areas, and once an expert says what they feel is the truth, we accept it, thinking there is nothing more we can do! All along I had been feeding the fear of failure of not getting the full use of my stove. I had done everything, so I thought, except take a fresh look, and think outside of the box I had set up for myself and see if there was something else that could be done! Even the expert hadn’t thought to do that!
How often do we keep “feeding our fears” until we quit and give up! Today I hope you will see it is time to be strong and face them with a fresh new look, and see what happens!
“Simply” Sue
Halcyon MacKnight, author of our great quote, is a 3 Time Olympian,12 Time All American, Speaker, Author, and Founder of HM Academy.