I couldn’t figure out how to put all the puzzle pieces of my week together. There were things to do, places to go, and people to see, but I couldn’t work out how to make it all come together. The harder I tried to see my way to a solution, the cloudier it all became.

Rather than spinning in mental circles while staring at my calendar, I decided to take a walk with God and one of Her/His/Their favorite dogs, Gracie-the-chocolate labradoodle. Over time I’ve learned that a walk outside can be the fastest route to new ideas, creative solutions, and a general clearing of the mental and emotional cobwebs that can gum up my thinking. Throwing on my boots and pulling on a warm jacket and wool beanie, we headed down our road. White snow, blue sky, green pine trees, and crisp, cold air, it was a spectacular winter morning. With each step my grip on the puzzle pieces of my time loosened, freeing them to begin to shift and move together in ways I hadn’t even imagined, much less considered. By the time I got back to the house I had a clear picture of how to proceed.

Same puzzle pieces, different picture.

When you purchase a puzzle there is only one way to put the pieces together to create the picture on the cover of the box. Doing it the one-and-only right way is the one-and-only goal, and can become our one-and-only approach to the puzzle that is our life. But we don’t arrive on the planet as a bunch of pieces in a box to be put together in a certain way once and for all. The beauty of being human is that we get to be the creators of our own lives, arranging and rearranging our puzzle as we allow our experiences to inform and transform us.

Because we can be prone to doing whatever it is in the way in which we’ve always done it, we might lose sight of the possibility of rearranging our pieces as makes sense in the here and nowness of our life. In our relationships, our work, our spiritual lives, our daily habits, rituals and rhythms, our creative endeavors, and our own inner workings, we have the amazing gift of discovering new ways to put it all together. To arrange our pieces so that they better connect who we are with how we live. But only if we loosen our grip on the pieces, and let them begin to shift and move in ways we hadn’t even imagined, much less considered.

Same puzzle pieces, different picture.

A walk outside can be a good place to start.