In early October, I went on a hike in Yosemite with the fitbit group I belong to. In the middle of the hike, we walked uphill for a while then we had to walk downhill. I was gratefully for the break; however, after a couple of minutes, I realized that walking downhill now (easy) means that on the way back, we would have to walk uphill. Also walking uphill is usually hard, AND after a long hike, it would be doubly hard because I would be tired. I mentioned this to LP Anan, the monk walking with us, and he asked me how it relates to raising my son, Jason.

I started thinking about how I was raising my son, Jason. I wanted to teach him to reason, to be independent, to think for himself. How was I going to do this? I was going to give him plenty of instruction on the “proper” way to do things. Instruct him on “proper” manners. Rather than let him experiment through trial and error, I would show him how I would do it and expect him to do it my way.

My idea of raising him was the same as walking downhill. I was looking for a way that would be easy for me, and not necessarily the best for Jason. And as a result of the taking the easy way, I now have an uphill battle to correct what I did. Rather than be more independent, Jason has become scared of making the wrong decision, so he has not become independent. Because I lecture him too much when he does wrong or gets caught in a lie, he would rather run the risk of getting caught in a lie than to “get into trouble.”

Another example of how the easy way out is causing me problems is my messy house. When guests come over, I clean off the tables in the front of the house and move the stuff to the computer room in the back of the house. Over time the stuff accumulates. When I gather the mail, I would look at each item to see if it was important, if it wasn’t important, I would just throw the mail on the dining room table. For me since I am semi-retired, I took the easy way out when I comes to household duties. I can do it later because I have time. When I would pay bills and needed to file a copy of the receipt for tax purposes or it was an important document that I needed to keep, I would put it in a pile for filing later. Now I have a pile of documents that I need to sort though. Now my laziness had become out of control. I now have piles of mail I need to throw and bills I need to file.

As GI-Joe would say – Now you know and knowing is half the battle. It is going to be an “uphill” battle to get me out of these situations, but now that I see the damage I have caused and the suffering I caused myself for taking the easy way out. I’m determined to work harder to correct it.