UNFINISHED BUSINESS

I have OCD – sort of…

It was undiagnosed, but I am pretty sure I had the not fun, truly disruptive to life kind of OCD for many years, but by the grace of God, lots of support from my wife, time, prayer, study… I am so much better.

Now a days I seem to have the married man of 11 years, dad to a 2 year old kind of OCD. You might call it Dad OCD or grumpy old man OCD; I’m 33 as of writing this, so I don’t really like the old man moniker.

Either way it all come to this, I find myself on a project and no matter how late it is, how inconvenient it might be to those around me, I am suddenly seized by the need to solve that problem or complete that project tonight come hell or high water!

Last week it was rummaging through old laptops, fumbling to get them powered up as I looked for some missing photographs of the day I proposed; great story.

Last night it was walking down my neighborhood like a sketchy person trying to see how many of those green plastic lidded boxes they had in their yard. I have three and I am supposed to have four. Somewhere hidden away is my green box with the valves to my sprinklers…

A guy on youtube said that the reason my sprinkler head is leaking is probably not the sprinkler head, which is good because I’ve never repaired a sprinkler head.

Apparently youtube video guy said it’s probably my sprinkler valves, which is good I guess, except I’ve never repaired a sprinkler valve, and after maybe 1-2 hours on and off of me looking around, and digging into the ground cover with my feet, I also can’t find my sprinkler valves if I did want to fix them.

I want you to know the tears streaming down my face are happy tears. It’s probably just sweat coming out of my eyes, not exhaustion, frustration, driven by the obsessive need to find those valves. I’m kidding, that was last night, maybe, I’ll leave you guessing.

No I won’t, I don’t want to lose my man card on this one, no actual tears were shed, I did however appear to get tiny particles of dirt or bark in my eye. All good now, I’ll just use my left on from now on.

Get to the point!

I wrote that last sentence real big and in bold to break up the big text block above, in the hopes that those of you skimming this won’t just give up before I you know, get to the point.

Here it is – Unfinished business is hard to deal with. 

Frustrating home projects are one thing, but many of you reading this are walking through much worse and have been for a while now, maybe a long while, so long it feels like it’s always been this way.

• Marriage trouble.

• Chronic health problems, especially when they can’t find the cause.

• Legal trouble.

• Financial trouble or even opportunities that have dragged on.

• Unanswered prayers.

• Children you’re believing will come back to God and back home.

My wife Ali and I are so blessed, but we’ve had our share of these more weighty moments of waiting too.

Quick break: in the most recent episode of my podcast – Can I Ask You A Question?

I nerd out on how to build your own personal library. The episode is one part file management and one part legacy leaving, bulwark against tyranny building call to action.

You can listen to it right now on your favorite podcasting app: Apple, Spotify, YouTube

What’s the solution?

As I thought about my present problem with the sprinkler and then of the larger financial situation and ongoing health problems we’ve been walking through, a thought occurred to me, really more a phrase.

Moving forward without moving on.

What I was tempted to do last night was stop everything else to focus entirely on my present problem.

That sounds nice, and grit is awesome and necessary, but if I am honest that’s not all that was driving my desire to stay put on that one problem.

The other more dark motivation was anger. I was mad that this ever happened to me in the first place, mad that God let it happen, mad that I wasn’t skilled enough, or man enough to just fix it!

So like a toddler I just wanted to sit there and make the world suffer while I waited!

Wait am I still talking about the sprinkler?

Either way, I am willing to bet I’m not the only one who feels that way from time to time, maybe even now.

Clearly staying stuck on the problem that won’t budge isn’t working, so I am having to move forward without moving on.

Here’s what I mean by that.

Moving Forward: 

We need to make progress where we can, when we can, in the other areas where we can.

A few doors may be closed, but in my life experience I have never seen all the doors closed. We have a responsibility to everyone we love, including ourselves, to keep moving forward.

Without Moving On:

We don’t have to like the problem, and unless insurmountable evidence and or God say otherwise, we don’t need to let go or give up on finding a solution or achieving a victory.

We can keep praying for healing, keep working through the finances, keep talking with our spouse, keep believing for a miracle…

It’s often good and right that we do so.

Now it’s your turn.

Last night I sowed some seeds for future success. I reached out to a few people and hopefully today I’ll get some answers that will help me find those sprinkler valves!

What can you do today while you wait for solutions in those other areas tomorrow? Where do you do need to move forward without moving on?

You’ve subscribed to these weekly wise letters, now continue the journey with my weekly podcast Can I Ask You A Question!

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See you next Thursday!

Geno Schmelzer,