Vectors-mathematical expressions of magnitude and direction that conjure up frightful memories of college physics. They drove me nuts. I’d want to go one way, they would point the other. Madness. I’d over-analyze and break bend a few pencils along the way.
I can still remember looking in disbelief at my first test results in college physics. Let’s just say the sea level was abysmally low that day-near C level. One simple principle had sunk me. Vectors.
To my dismay, I had reversed all of them on the test.
Vectors indicate direction. One direction positive-the other negative. You mix those up and instead of traveling to a tropical island you find yourself in Greenland. I ended up in the Arctic Circle.
How could I have messed up something as simple as direction? Easy. I over-analyzed it, over-thought it. My mind was spinning, grasping for universal truth when all I had to do was draw a simple arrow pointing where I needed to go.
Life can’t be as simple as a drawing an arrow, can it? In this instance it was. Too many thoughts of logical debates spun around in my mind when I should have been acting, drawing.
Sad, but true.
I stopped over-analyzing started acting and as a result floated to the surface of the physics sea that year. Well, I at least floated in the B region and won my battle with vectors.
The test was many years ago, and with age I’m left to ponder how many times in life I have over-analyzed, missed the mark when I should have been drawing arrows.
Why did it take me so long to homeschool?
I over-analyzed the cost factor, debated the logic. All was logic, thinking, analyzing. Sure we need to prepare for grand events in life, but there comes a point when you must act.
Action is either deliberate or you find yourself tossed into the raging sea as you fight to swim.
I drew my arrow in the sand, crossed over to the other side and now see how my over-analyzing was unneeded, unnecessary and could have cost me the adventure of a lifetime.
Too much logic, my logic could have cost us dearly. Fortunately, I’m learning my logic is limited.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Isaiah 55:8-9 ESV
Each day I strive to act. To listen to the Words that will direct me. My logic will fail me, my arrows will point in the wrong directions at times, but thankfully I know One who will never steer me wrong.
As I seek to follow the direction He points, I know that I’m on the right path.
I’m soaring above the sea.