I received a generous birthday gift card from my brother and sister-in-law to Michaels, the craft store. They’re now open again, so I took a field trip this afternoon to explore and shop. I wanted to stock up on threads, beads, baubles (sequins, buttons, etc.) and cool containers to house my newfound items. I approached with a sense of excitement and exploration.

Have you ever been to Michaels? There are just short of a million aisles–now one-way–and filled with every conceivable enticement, size and material a human could seek. I went in with a sense of my needs, but soon felt completely overwhelmed.

There are so many options that my fear of getting it wrong, not being able to use what I bought, or worse, finding something better tomorrow, had me nearly paralyzed. I could feel my heart beating faster, my breath getting short, and my shoulders rising.

Sensing this was going on, I had to have a brief conversation with myself. “Jane,” I says…and smiled at the sheer hilarity of what I was deeming an issue.

That I might get the wrong size container for my beads? That the shade of orange I select won’t be right? That I might not already be an expert at a craft I learned four months ago?

I know we can’t measure every mundane task against our national state of affairs, but it does help me to right-size my thinking and put things in perspective.

That need to appear right, to quickly master what we set out to do, or be instantly renowned for our efforts extracts the sad price of diminishing the value of the learning curve.

After my self-lecture, I went to the checkout counter, satisfied with my purchases, even though I did inquire about their return policy and tuck away my receipt.