Fairies at the cradle

Duchess earned a big promotion yesterday in her after-school martial arts program,ending her beginner status and marking the start of her fighting training. She is very, very proud. She's also switching from the after-school program to twice-a-week evening classes, and she's excited to be able to go into the more advanced class level. 

Duchess is still pretty crushed about having to leave the after-school program, but she is handling it in her usual Duchess style. Duchess leaps quickly to operatic tragedy levels, but she is also impressively quick to identify and dive into positive alternatives. I offered her the narrative that she had been fortunate to be able to advance through the beginner phase very quickly, thanks to every-day classes in the after-school program, and now she had a chance to train in a more measured, intensive way for cheaper, thereby saving the family much-needed money while also working with more serious students and teachers. She took the narrative, turned it over in her mind for ten seconds, and ran with it. 

I've described Duchess here as lacking resilience and persistence. But she can also nimbly shift gears, try different approaches, and see other perspectives.She is willing to let go of something that isn't working, without losing momentum, and that is an uncommon gift.*

* And yes, this can obviously be a curse as well as a gift, but I'm not going to overthink it. For now. But if she joins a cult, I'm going to need your help busting her out.