Spotlight the teacher - Blog post - The Power of 'yes I can!' by Jacqui Speed

Every month we spotlight one of our fabulous members! This month we have been getting to know more about Jacqui Speed from Purlwise!  See our previous blog post for a written interview with Jacqui. Jacqui runs Purlwise in Brampton, Cambridgeshire. You can find out more about Purlwise on her Knitting For All teacher page and on her own website. We are delighted to share this blog post written by Jacqui about her thoughts on the power of 'yes I can!' What could you do if you changed 'no I can't' to 'yes I can!'?

The Power of 'yes I can!' by Jacqui Speed

Isn’t it funny how we can always see things in other people more easily than we can ourselves.  At one time I had a wool shop and I noticed how many times I heard “oh, I couldn’t do that” often from people who were really experienced makers. I thought about this for a while and not only realised that I say it myself (of course!) but that I think it means one of two things:

I could do that but I don’t want to (that’s fine... bungy jumping is not on my list any more!)

I could do that but I don’t know how to...

Why do I think that?  When we’re born we don’t really know how to do anything.  We don’t know how to write or draw, ride a bike, build a house or scale a mountain.  All these things are learned.

I know, I can hear some of you saying that there are sometimes very real limitations to what we can do, and I agree, but if the desire is there we see examples every day of people overcoming seemingly insurmountable obstacles.

It just makes me so sad to hear us limit ourselves just by our words. All my life I’ve been saying I can’t draw, as a result every time I pick up a pencil my brain freezes, my hand goes all stiff and sure enough what comes out is terrible.  But what would I say to anyone else?... it takes practice!

So let’s try saying “Yes, I’m sure I can do that” and then get out there and do it! I’ve signed up for some art classes and I’m trying to practice (mostly drawing jumpers).  I really hope you’ll think about the times that you say I can’t and try “Yes I can!”