The Shelf and the Struggle
Letting Go of Expectations and Learning to Ask for Help
There’s this moment I keep coming back to, even though it happened over a year ago. It’s a small memory, one that might seem insignificant to anyone else, but it’s stayed with me, hovering in the background of my mind. I was standing in my parents’ garage, surrounded by the familiar smell of sawdust and motor oil, struggling to fix this old, crooked shelf that had collapsed out of nowhere. It was one of those shelves that had seen better days, its wood worn from years of holding up forgotten boxes of knickknacks and holiday decorations. I thought it would be an easy fix — just a few screws and it’d be as good as new. But no matter how much I adjusted, how many angles I tried, the thing refused to line up. It was as if the universe had conspired against this simple task.
Each second that ticked by, I felt myself getting more frustrated — not at the shelf, but at everything. It wasn’t about a piece of wood anymore. It felt like the shelf was some kind of cruel metaphor for my whole life. Things were falling apart, and I was desperately trying to keep them together, to fit the pieces back into place, but I couldn’t. I was failing.
To be fair, I wasn’t in the middle of a life-shattering crisis or anything. It wasn’t one of those dramatic low points people talk…
