The Carpenter Bee

Dear loving people,

Nature always has a lot to teach us as we grapple with our quest for success. When you stay close to nature, you have a greater chance of gathering lessons from natural phenomena that can change the way you approach life.

I visited my grandmother in the village one Christmas season. On arrival, she was away to the farm so I sat on her veranda awaiting her return. Sitting there in a warm afternoon breeze, I heard the sound of a carpenter bee humming above me. Looking up, I noticed that it was testing the wood of the time-honored roof trying to bore a hole. Each time it did not get the right spot, it moved on. Then it came to an old and abandoned hole on the wood with cobwebs at the entrance. It hovered around it for a while and finally went in.

“At last, it found a safe heaven” I told myself in relief.  Some minutes later, I heard the usual heavy humming produced when a carpenter bee is at work boring into a wooden surface. “It is probably renovating its new found home” I thought. Strangely enough, the bee is a risk taker. It was not afraid of the dark hole it was entering; there might just have been a predator inside that hole. It did not only go in but set to work the moment it took possession of the hole.

How many of us hit the ground running in our quest for success? The typical failure-tendency is to give excuses why things should wait. We are so afraid to take risks, to enter the dark and unknown holes of life. The saying goes, “No sweat, no gain.” Start now or you might join the ranks of those who will lament in five years from now why they didn’t start today.

Now! Carpenter bees are large, black and yellow insects about 25 mm long. They bore into wood to construct their nests. They are capable of drilling a large number of 13 mm diameter holes in preferred sites. They often reuse the same nesting sites year after year. Nail holes, exposed saw cuts and unpainted wood often attract these bees. Porches, garages, shed ceilings; roof overhangs and outdoor wooden furniture are common nesting sites. They often refurbish old tunnels instead of boring new ones.

Given that continued borings may weaken wooden structures, and the yellow sawdust and waste materials may stain cars, clothing or furniture; one technique in managing them is to seal the tunnels they bore. The holes should be plugged deeply with putty or caulking compound. If the tunnels are plugged without first killing the insects, any carpenter bee trapped inside will bore new openings. Yes! You heard me.

The big lesson from this account is that carpenter bees have learned to resolve the obstacles they encounter no matter how challenging by finding lasting solutions to them as they come. Did you get that? When their holes are caulked for whatever reason, they don’t surrender and die inside, that urge to live; to define new paths gets them boring a new hole from within to get out of the entrapment. Imagine the dust and waste they have to deal will to get an exit from inside.

How many times do you surrender in the face of the challenges you must overcome to succeed? How often do you allow troubles to tie you down, to render you mediocre and lifeless? Be the carpenter bee that will not surrender to those who entraps it in its hole but will set to work and bore its way out of the trap.