Are You Any Good?

First published as a musing on CanadianDoomer.ca in 2012, but it’s even more true now, in a world that seems determined to keep us guessing about what’s next.

Let’s get something out of the way: Most of us don’t actually know how capable we are. We don’t get a report card for “surviving upheaval,” or a diploma for “navigating total chaos with only a spatula and two feet of duct tape.” No one hands you a medal for keeping your family fed when the pantry’s looking bare and the next grocery run is a week away.

I was reminded of this the other night, of all places, while reading a Barbara Hambly novel (Sisters of the Raven – highly recommended for anyone who likes their fantasy with a side of desert survival).

One character asks, “Are you any good?” Not at school or work or the easy stuff, but at staying alive when everything’s hard – climbing trees, dodging danger, keeping hope alive.

The answer:

“I don’t think she knows how good she is, any more than any of us do, until we have to find it out.”

It hit me like a brick. Because here’s the secret: most of us, especially those who’ve grown up with grocery stores, hot water, and phones that tell you the weather, have no idea what we’re capable of until we’re up against it.

You Learn By Living

If I’d understood how much work it actually takes to put up a year’s worth of food – shelves of home-canned tomatoes, enough potatoes to get through to May, and something other than jam for variety – I’d never have tried. Honestly, I would have quit before I started, just from the overwhelm.

And yet, every year, I get a little better.

• The first year, I didn’t put up fruit. Who needs vitamin C, right?
• The next, we ran out of root vegetables long before the last frost.
• Some years, it was forgetting to label, so we played “mystery dinner” with the jars.
• I’ve burned out the clutch on more than one manual kitchen tool and learned the hard way that a pressure canner is not a slow-cooker.

But here’s the thing: Each time, I failed better.

Capability Isn’t Comfort

The story we tell ourselves, the story the world tells us, is that if we were really good at something, it wouldn’t feel this hard. That the truly capable never doubt, never get tired, never make a hash of things and cry in the pantry.

That’s a lie.

If you’ve ever stood in your kitchen, exhausted, kids hollering, wondering if you can actually do this – keep going. You’re already doing it. You don’t know how good you are because the test is still running.

Most of us are shockingly capable when we have to be.

Not just at surviving, but at adapting, learning, even thriving.

That’s why I do things the old, hard way, sometimes – using manual tools, eating from the garden, figuring it out with what’s on hand. Not to be a martyr, but to find out where my edges are. Because I’d rather fail while learning than be blindsided later.

You’re Stronger Than You Think

If you’d asked me before I became a mother if I could handle childbirth (or, let’s be honest, raising a toddler while sleep-deprived and running a household), I would have said: absolutely not. And yet, like every mother before me, I did it. Heck, I did it six times! Not because I was ready, but because I had to.

So here’s my gentle nudge, for you and for myself: You don’t know what you’re capable of until you’re in it. The only way to find out is to keep going, one messy, imperfect, deeply human step at a time.

If you’re facing something hard, whether it’s learning to live with less, building new habits, or just figuring out who you are now, remember:

You’re already more capable than you realize.

The only way to know how good you are is to keep living.

And every “mistake” you make is proof that you’re in the arena, getting better as you go.

You might not feel like a survival expert, a household manager, or a builder of resilient lives. But you’re here, you’re still trying, and that’s more than good enough.

Build a life that bends but never breaks. You’re stronger than you think.