Observations: Lemons and Loss
The frustration… the anger… the sheer inconvenience of it all! I was down to just one last lemon from my lemon tree. I’d set it out on the counter, and heard the - thwack! I don’t want to point any fingers here, but the toppled teriyaki sauce bottle certainly looked to be the guilty party in causing the last lemon to plummet to the kitchen tile and lose all perceivable appeal.
This caused me some serious reflection on how strong emotions can be over a frustrating little occurrence like this. What’s the lesson here? Life had given me a lemon, sure. But, I can’t make lemonade because life took away the same lemon.
Then I began framing the idea within the concept of loss.
Sometimes we lose.
That isn’t all there is to it though. Sure, I won’t actually be making lemonade; however, the occasional loss isn’t the end of the story. Be it keys, lemons, beliefs, our minds, our loved ones… loss, or perhaps just a lack of something, is not a final disposition in the court of life. It really isn’t the last word.
Loss inherently creates new things. Unfortunately, it most often creates emotions that we consider to be bad things. But, it also creates new perspectives, new depths of human empathy, and new experiences.
Taking the situation of loss and finding a way to build something from it probably creates some of the strongest examples of human achievement we ever see. There were astronauts who lost their lives before humankind landed on the moon. How many billions of minutes and hours of leisure time have been lost to further humanity via medicine, technology, and science? How many millions of people have lost their lives so others could have the freedom to vote, speak their minds, or even exist?
Loss can be tragic. But, it can also cause us to create some of our very best work.
The point? Don’t let loss or a lack of something you desire be a finality. Build from it, and you may find some of the most worthwhile building you’ve ever done is underway.
As for today, I just made something different for dinner, and it was delicious.