The Value of Not Being Good at Things

I recently decided that this February I wanted to learn how to knit. I like my embroidery, really love doing it in fact, but I’ve never really got the hang of knitting the last time I did it and I’m seeing all of these amazing designs online. It gave me that little bit of a push to go “I want to learn this”. And you know what?

I suck.

I can cast on, but any more than that? I am awful. I’m not getting the hang of it and I keep trying and the yarn is turning into a mess that’s all tangled but I’m keep going. I’m undoing the bits that I’ve just done and trying again. I’m practicing and getting used to holding needles that aren’t just the tiny embroidery ones I’m using.

It’s a very big thing to decide to learn for me, I’ve never been that coordinated with my hands and in the past when I tried it a little bit I was awful. Entirely. I couldn’t do anything. So this is more of a determined, “I want to learn a new skill” for me and I am going to learn it. I’m not giving up.

The value in not being good at things comes from this; you need to learn different approaches and problem solving skills. For me in this it’s learning how to hold the needles, learning how to not drop stitches constantly and so on. I’m learning how to do all of this and not be too frustrated when I make mistakes. I’m also learning how to have fun doing a difficult task. These are all important skills that aren’t just applicable to knitting and embroidery.

What I’m saying is to not give up. You’re maybe not good at the thing now but you’re going to improve and keep improving. Soon you’ll be making scarves and jumpers and gloves, or you’ll be doing those equations you were stuck on, or writing a full screenplay.

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Hey! Tara here and thanks for checking out my blog. I update every Tuesday with posts about studying tips, advice and talk about productivity and organisation too. If you want to keep up to date with my latest blog posts I’d love it if you subscribed to this blog.

#crafting #hobbies #knitting