Playing to Strengths and Not Being a Knitter

Every few months I receive a catalog from Knit Picks, and spend time "ohhing" and "ahhing" over the fun yarn and knit/crochet patterns you can buy from them. The last catalog I received inspired me to try knitting again. There are always so many cute knit patterns out there, that I felt like I was missing out on something, being a crocheter but not a knitter. A couple of years ago I ventured into knitting, and got good enough to make a washcloth! I sort of let my knitting knowledge slide, though, as I found it difficult to do. After looking through my catalog from Knit Picks, and tooling around some on Ravelry, I decided that 2011 would be the year I would take up knitting again.

Sunday afternoon: I dug out my needles, some yarn from my stash, and a basic "how-to" book on knitting. I refreshed myself on how to cast on (got that down after about 15 minutes), and then started to knit my first row. That's when I remembered why I don't like knitting. It was so frustrating: tension being wrong on the yarn, my fingers cramping up due to not being used to holding the yarn/needles, not being able to easily figure out how to fix a mistake, and most of all, remembering that knitting is s-l-o-w (when compared to crocheting, at least, I'm a slow knitter).

Later on that night, I was thinking about why I wanted to learn to knit. True, there are a lot more "fashionable" knit patterns out there than crochet patterns, but the truth is I have no desire to knit a sweater or socks for myself. The things I like to make (scarves, blankets, stocking caps, washclothes, baby booties, baby sweaters) I can do just fine with crochet. And, to be honest, I'm not bad at crocheting, as evidenced by this scarf I recently made for my mom from a lace-weight wool yarn, with a rather intricate pattern:





I realized that the things I'd like to make out of yarn, I can make by crocheting. To become really good at knitting would take me lots of time, frustration, and cramped fingers. Why spend my time & energy on that when instead I can continue to hone my crochet skills and become even better at something I'm already pretty good at?

This got me thinking too, of a leadership development program I'm currently going through, called "Leadership Detroit". One of the outcomes of this program is that I will be able to identify my strengths (and weaknesses), and learn how to use that knowledge to be a better leader. One of the things I've really appreciated in this program is the encouragement to identify strengths, and improve them. I think too often it is easy to get caught up in identifying just a weakness, and then pour time and energy into trying to improve that weakness. Maybe sometimes we just need to accept our weaknesses for what they are, and instead of trying to develop them in ourselves (and just become frustrated during the process), identify other people who have our weaknesses as a strength, and let them balance us out. I think that can be a good model for building a strong staff team in the workplace, and in life in general.

Obviously, there are some instances when a weakness should be worked upon to improve, and I don't mean to make a blanket statement that you should never try to improve in an area you struggle in. Instead, I think a balance needs to be found between identifying that which you are naturally good at, which comes naturally to you and that which you are not naturally wired for. This book has shaped my thinking on this.

So...saying all that say...in 2011 I hope to improve upon that which naturally I'm good at, and identifying those areas that I need to reasonably improve upon. Unfortunately, knitting does not fall into either of those categories.