Simple Knitting Tips: Don't gripe

I love it when friends say things that make me think. Recently a friend was making a point about the importance of having a positive attitude and I realized that I am very often guilty of forgetting this.

Rex, who didn't really drive and very much likes my Simple Knitting Tip: Don't gripe!

Later that day, as I was having to do a previously unscheduled kid pick up due to a change in my hubby's plans, I caught myself feeling a little a grouchy about having to do this errand and thought, this is exactly what she was talking about. So instead of complaining to myself about my lack of down time, I turned it around and focused on what I wasn't lacking: a kid to pick up, a husband who had the opportunity to go do something fun on the spur of the moment, a car that works well and gets me where I need to go, beautiful weather to drive in, and of course an adorable dog to ride along with me. This change in my focus made my whole evening better and what had been a chore became a treat.

And then I found some knitting parallels, naturally.

When you feel tempted to complain about knitting gone bad, be thankful you have the opportunity to knit. When you feel the sting of injustice because you can't afford expensive yarn, accept the fact that it's not always the price of a thing that makes it precious. When you can't master a complicated project and this makes you want to give up altogether, stop and pick up something with a simple garter stitch and remember the joys of just knitting for the fun of it.

In knitting, as in life, when you choose to focus on what you have and the positive things around you, then you will discover that life is good and so is knitting. Isn't that why we started knitting in the first place?

I know it's not always easy to remember this. Sometimes it seems like literally nothing is going as planned. Sometimes we just need to vent and be grouchy. Sometimes no matter how many times you rip back a project, you still won't come out with the correct stitch count at the end of Row 12. I have found that if I am also griping about whatever is going wrong, it makes it harder to do/endure/fix.

I hope this tip is helpful for you in knitting and in life. In searching for some lofty, poetic, intellectual-sounding quote to cap off this post, I ran across this, which I liked even better, by Bernard M. Baruch, former Presidential adviser and South Carolinian:

"You can overcome anything if you don't bellyache."

Exactly.