My mother liked putting puzzles together. Sometimes they had over 1000 pieces. I remember watching her hold one piece in her hand for the longest time until she found a connecting piece. Sometimes my siblings and I would work on the puzzle with her, sometimes looking with her to find the location of that one piece. We experienced with her the satisfaction of watching the puzzle slowly come together. My father compared life to a puzzle, and indeed I have been able to look back and see how the pieces have come together.
There is always a temptation to force pieces in places where they don’t fit, and there is the constant desire to find the pieces quickly. As I reflect on my mother’s method of putting pieces of similar colors together, looking carefully for shapes that may fit together, and holding one piece for an extended period until it could be properly placed, I find keys to putting my life’s puzzle together.
Success is not always found in the fastest solution. Discipline does not always involve speed. Somethings in life look like a perfect fit but a closer look at the edges or background may reveal that that piece cannot be placed until other pieces of the puzzle come together. The good thing about most puzzles is that there is a picture on the box that shows what the finished product should look like. As we live our lives, we may only have glimpses of what the finished product should look like, but as the pieces come together the picture in our mind becomes clearer. Being disciplined for success is keeping the big picture in mind, but also holding each piece patiently and carefully until its place can be found, it is becoming what we were created to become.