I knew it would be a stretch. But, I really wanted to try it. Drawing with two hands at the same time is hard, but it’s really good. Simply put, it makes both sides of your brain work together, a dialog that helps us more fully express and understand emotions and thoughts and has even shown to increase measures of intelligence and processing.

We showed the children pictures of trees from all over the world–including some from our own yards and those of some of their friends from the orphanage who have already been adopted. Then, we asked them to draw one of them using both hands at the same time.

Some said they couldn’t. Some said it was too hard. Some simply said no.

But we said hǎo bù hǎo, just try it. Yes, it’s hard, but just try it. See what happens when you try something hard.

And, most of them did.

And, it was good. As their brains were making firing away and making connections, we were also making connections. And, I stood back in awe, wanting a recording of the scene happening before me to be forever recorded in my own brain.

Maybe this week that started rough with lots of surprises and some new structure and rules that seemed at first would hold us back wasn’t going to be so bad after all.