I started this test for the third time. By the second question the panic was bigger than me. This new industry I am working in is different and I am trying to get this certification so I can follow along with the action.

I’m used to picking up certifications–it’s fun learning new things. When the manager suggested it, of course I said I would give it a try. Water math, they called it.

The first part seemed easy.

I was wrong. This math is impossible.

I’d invested in the online class, and the team I’d joined told me that it wouldn’t be a big deal.

Now the unit conversions between gallons pounds, acres, liters and milligrams were a cliff I couldn’t scale.

I tried to go back to the beginning and try again. Write it down, do it slow.

But the storm of thoughts made the facts slippery. Maybe I wasn’t capable of this kind of learning anymore. It would become clear to everyone else that I was in the wrong place, not the right person and would be asked to leave. My presence would be an insult to the other people, best swept away and not spoken of again—at least not publicly.

With those terrifying monstrous ideas whirling through my head, it was impossible to convert pounds of chlorine to the correct dose into quantities of million gallons per day.

I knew better than to start the test for the third time. It was a desperate move, apparent the moment I started again. As if magic would suddenly happen, and I would know the answers without making the effort.

I thought I knew better. My panic was picking up new evidence for how impossible this was, and how everything else in my life was impossible and I was doomed to failure at everything I attempted.

Carrying the momentum I went to my martial arts class, and was able to teach my class a new move. It wasn’t new to me at this time, but it had been a while since I’d done it. It came back to me. I remembered how impossible it was the first few months when I’d tried to learn it.

And this night, I had forgotten that I’d learned it. Until I did it again. Almost as easy as walking.

I had done the impossible once. I had another story to calm the panic. The next morning I picked up the homework again. I re-read, wrote it all out again, and spent another set of hours. The panic came with, but I was able to quiet it enough to keep going.

I did not need magic after all. I found a way to keep trying and that let me stop the free fall. It’s going to take longer than I first thought, but it lost the impossible part.