All Creatures Great And Small:
Siegfried talks to James Herriot about Herriot getting married to Helen. James Herriot can only see all the obstacles ahead of him.
He says that he is not earning enough, he says that he has no house and furniture, so he is afraid of asking her to marry him and he is afraid of supporting her etc. He fears it not working out. So he is allowing the real and imagined obstacles to build a strong wall of defeat between him and happiness with Helen.
Siegfried says this:
“Caution is often a virtue, but in your case you carry it too far. It’s a little flaw in your character and it shows in a multitude of ways. In your wary approach to problems in your work, for instance – you are always too apprehensive, proceeding fearfully step by step when you should be plunging boldly ahead.”
“You keep seeing dangers when there aren’t any – you’ve got to learn to take a chance, to lash out a bit. As it is, you are confined to a narrow range of activity by your own doubts.”
At one point James Herriot says to Siegfried, “You make it all sound easy!”
“But it IS Easy! Siegfried shot upright in his chair, “Go out and ask that girl without further delay and get her into church before the month is out!
He wagged a finger at Herriot, “Learn to grasp the nettle of life, James. Throw off your hesitant ways…”
Herriot writes:
‘And I don’t suppose I am the first person to have had his life fundamentally influenced by one of Siegfried chance outbursts. …he planted a seed which germinated and flowered almost overnight. There is no doubt that he is responsible for the fact that I was the father of a grown up family while I was still a young man…’
James does asks Helen to marry him, and she happily says yes.
Siegfried makes James Herriot a partner in the business, and James and Helen move upstairs above the business and live up there.”
It all worked out, but it would never have worked out unless James Herriot got the courage to have a go instead of being too careful and believing in all the so-called obstacles that were not there, they existed mostly only in his mind.
And even if there are obstacles, marriage is about two people working through them, plowing over them, and making their life together work, because being together is their dream created in heaven.
If all married couples were dedicated to living a life together forever, then we would all find our little garden of Eden and our own little piece of heaven here on earth.
♥
All the best from
James M Sandbrook.
28 February 2015.