Since starting the adoption process about 10 months ago, I’ve been more aware of the stories I tell myself, the words I use over and over again, the beliefs that I hold, and questioning how they affect my life.

Do these stories enhance my life or do they limit me?

I was talking the other day with a friend and we got onto the subject of rice.

He told me how rice lasts forever once you cook it. He said, “You can keep it for weeks after cooking it.”

I replied, “Oh no you can’t! It’s a big germinator. It’s got a very short life. Two days in the fridge, three max.”

Then he told me how when he first moved out of home years ago and was living with roommates, one guy used to cook up a huge batch of rice and when cooked they would put the whole pot in the cupboard – not even in the fridge – and they’d scoop out what they needed each night for as long as there was rice in there (sometimes a week or more).

Then when it was done, they’d wash the pot and start all over again. He told me that there was always cooked rice in the cupboard waiting to be eaten. Then finished his story with, “I’m surprised at the things I did back then that didn’t kill me with what I know now.”

And it got me thinking.

What are the stories (or theories) I tell over and over really about? Doubt, or Hope and Love?

My comment about rice came from an article I read only a few years back about rice being a housing estate of food-poisoning and that you couldn’t keep it for longer than a few days in a refrigerator without risk.

For some reason, even though I never researched the advice from the article any further than the one read, that article stuck with me and I’ve found myself repeating that “wisdom” to friends and family when the occasion called for it.

How long can you keep rice? Two, maybe three, days tops.

(note: I just Google searched it and the first 10 links said 3-6 days in a fridge – and many had stipulations like “must be put in the fridge within two hours” or “must be cooled quickly”…none of the answers were exactly the same.)

But my friend was right…when we were fresh out of home and living on our own for the first time we DID do things that with our “now knowledge” would likely kill us, or at least have us visiting the emergency room, or the porcelain bowl.

But they didn’t affect us at the time.

Why?

Because we didn’t “know” that they were supposed to affect us.

That story that I read, and have repeated, may or may not have been founded in truth, but they believed it enough to share the story. And I accepted it as fact and shared it too…and so it grows.

The “truth” is though, that those who don’t know, may live their whole lives with cooked rice in a pot in the cupboard for weeks on end and eat from it daily without knowing that they are supposed to get sick.

My friend reminded me with that story that our lives are the sum-total of our beliefs.

If we believe rice is going to be bad for us after a few days and we eat it anyway, we will likely get an upset stomach and then be able to tell ourselves “I told you so”. (So you don’t think you’re crazy!)

But if we have no beliefs about the rice, then we wouldn’t give it a second thought and likely nothing will happen.

In that moment of realisation, felt sad that I had again shared this theory about rice with a friend who will now think about what I’ve said the next time he cooks up a batch.

Even if he didn’t believe me fully, even if the belief he had in his early 20’s can outweigh the story I told, he will still likely think about it for a moment when he next cooks rice.

The seed of doubt has been planted.

I feel ashamed that I planted a seed of doubt in his mind, and that I have ever planted a seed of doubt in anyone’s mind.

Ideally, I wish to only plant good seeds in the hearts and minds of everyone around me. As do we all, I’m sure.

This is a very important desire to recognize before I have children, and I’m so thankful that we had this conversation about the shelf-life of cooked rice.

I want to ensure that I plant seeds of hope, seeds of courage, seeds of faith, seeds of belief, seeds of possibility, seeds of love, seeds of encouragement – and never ever entertain or plant seeds of doubt, or seeds of fear – in the hearts and minds of my children. And everyone really, but especially children.

I often hear children, even at 4 or 5 years old, stating things like “I am lazy” or “I am a slow learner” or whatever it is that they’ve been told again and again… those seeds of doubt, seeds of discouragement, take hold.

Then the child starts to repeat what they’ve been told, and the more they repeat it, the more they believe it, and when they believe it – that is who they become.

Why would we ever plant a seed within a child (or anyone) that we love that is filled with anything but love, hope, kindness, possibility, positivity, encouragement, and faith?

It didn’t sit well with me to have instilled a minute grain of doubt in my friend even about something as unimportant as cooked rice – I definitely don’t want to feel that feeling of instilling doubt in the mind of a child about their personal character.

This post is a reminder for me to consciously, from this point forward, make the choice to always plant good positively charged seeds with anyone I converse with, and especially with my future children.

I want to become consciously aware of the stories I tell myself that are not serving me well, that are planting seeds of doubt or fear or discouragement in my own life…so I can weed them out and replace them with stories that do serve me well. Stories that uplift and inspire both myself and those around me.

How about you? Are there well-weathered stories that you tell, that are planting seeds of doubt? Are there any that could be told differently?

Let me know in the comments 🙂

Warm smiles and Love,

Ali Jayne 🙂