NO!!! I WILL DO IT!!

For those of you who don't know me (Hi, whoever you are!) I am a proud mama of two of the most awesome kids ever: an insanely smart almost-four-year-old boy and a vibrant, charismatic almost-three-year-old girl. They are the best (and worst) part of my day every single day.

Easter egg hunting!

But as anyone who has ever raised a toddler knows, it can often be a little bit frustrating. Though both of my kids have always been fairly independent, my daughter has recently taken this to a whole new level. The phrase I hear more often than any other is "I WILL DO IT! I WILL DO IT BY MYSELF!!"

Nothing is simple anymore. For example, instead of taking 2 minutes to get her changed and dressed in the mornings, I now have to gather all my patience and watch her do every single bit of it by herself very, very slowly. It's so hard to watch her struggle for two or three minutes for something I could have done in 30 seconds. (And yes, I have to watch her. That's one of her requirements.) Any time I try to offer help, it's met with another yell: "NO! I WILL DO IT! I WILL DO IT BY MYSELF!"

Don't get me wrong--I admire her persistence. She's determined to do every single thing on her own, no matter how much she struggles and no matter how long it takes. SHE WILL DO IT BY HERSELF.

While watching this struggle the other day, a thought popped into my head: this must be how God feels on a daily basis with me. He knows the solutions to all my problems. He can help with everything I'm struggling with. Everything could be so much better, so much faster, but instead, I'm down here making everything so much more complicated than it has to be, yelling, "I WILL DO IT BY MYSELF!"