Catch and cradle

A couple of years ago one my dear friends invited me to a Women of Faith Conference. I was wowed at all the great music and speakers. I got to hear Steven Curtis Chapman sing and give testimony about losing one of his daughters and how that impacted his family and life. The lady who played Blair on the Facts of  Life was their and we got to hear her testimony. But the biggest impact on me that weekend came from a speaker named Marcus Buckingham. Marcus has written a few books and has even been on the Oprah show, talking about successful people and how to become one of them. Marcus's job was to research, find and interview the most successful and happiest people from certain companies and figure out what makes them so good at their jobs; so the company could train others to be better at their jobs. I thought what a cool job. He then took this same concept and looked at Women in general, and wrote a book about it called Find your Strongest Life.

Marcus gives many tools in this book on how to be successful, but the most mind blowing technique is called the catch and cradle. First he gives lots of statistics on how it is nearly impossible to do two or more things at once, well. You can drive and talk on the cell phone at the same time but you aren't going to be driving well or paying much attention to the person on the phone. Now this just bothered me. I had always thought that I was good at multi tasking. I have never had a job that didn't require that of me. In fact it is something they look for in interviews and will not hire you for if you aren't good at it. So when he said that the successful women that he interviewed were not multi taskers I was shocked. He explained that the happiest and most successful women were good at catching what ever moment they were in and cradling it. At the conference he told a story about a women that he was at a business function with. And he said that she was fa away from home and during a business dinner this lady excused herself and went outside for about 15 minutes. The same time the next day she did the same thing and this time he followed her out there. Much to his surprise he found her singing into the telephone. When she was finished he politely asked her what she was doing and she said that when she is away from her kids she always sings them to sleep over the phone. No matter where she was or what she was doing. She was cradling the moment.

Now looking back at the story; I think of how many times I rush through important moments in life to get to something that isn't important. Or talk on the phone and watch TV or play on the internet at the same time.  I wonder what I am missing by not cradling these moments. I noticed last night when I spoke with my best friend of 12 years that I didn't play on the internet or do anything but talk to her. I realized that I was cradling this moment with her because she lived so far away and we don't get to talk often. When is it that we go from cherishing simple moments to barely noticing them. My new years resolution is to catch and cradle more moments with my daughter and husband, family and friends. In church and in public. I know that if I were to do this then I will accomplish more of what God wants me to do. After all doesn't He catch us when we fall and cradle us in times of trouble?