Once upon a time, I was a preschool teacher. And then I wasn't.
I can blame everything under the sun: large classrooms, low pay, mean parents, difficult children, unsupportive administration. At the end of the day, my dream job became a nightmare. I started crying before I went to work, crying after I got home from work -- sometimes even during work. I tried everything I could to keep on "fighting the good fight": teacher workshops, tai chi, yoga, long vacations... but, truly, nothing was going to change the fact that I had burned out and that this job wasn't for me anymore. I finished out my last year, said goodbye to everything, and retreated back home.
I didn't realize just how bad the burnout was until a week later, when I tried to go on the job search sites and found myself repeatedly having visceral reactions. At best, I would get repulsed and immediately stop the search. At worst, I would get sick to my stomach and spend the rest of the day numbly watching TV. The after effects were so intense that, even a month later, when my own tai chi instructor emailed me about an opportunity to teach tai chi at a yoga studio, I had to prepare myself as if I were about to go skydiving or base jumping. I had to quell the part of me that never wanted to get invested in any type of career field ever again and talk with the owner and go to the interview and have my demo class.
Within weeks, I knew I had made the right decision. Preschool teaching was out, but teaching adults the very same calming techniques that I had so desperately clung to was definitely in. This eventually evolved into enrolling in a yoga teacher training, so I could become a registered yoga teacher and give back just a little bit of what yoga had given to me.
I would tell people about my background in education, and how I was transitioning into tai chi and yoga teaching, and I would get met with the same response:
"You could totally teach tai chi/yoga to children!"
Everyone, from friends, to family, to the studio and dojo owners I would talk with in regards to setting up a class, has offered that bit of advice. And, each time, I had to swallow down that visceral, nauseous feeling in my stomach.
I would smile and nod and maybe reply back with a, "We'll see." Because -- how could I explain to them how I felt? How could I even explain to myself how I felt. Up until last year, I swore that working with groups of children was tailor made for me. I had been babysitting since I was 12, volunteering in the nursery room at my hometown's church since I was 14. I had my student-teaching at an incredible preschool in Boston and even noted to one of my supervising teachers that it didn't even feel like I was going to work, the job was that natural to me. I would tell people I taught preschool and get met with a, "You totally look like a preschool teacher!" That was me, that was how I defined me, and now that was gone. Gone to the point that I had to suppress a grimace when the mention of even being in the same room as a large group children came up.
The topic of training to teach children's yoga came up during my last RYT training session. Everyone talked about that particular training and the yoga instructor who runs it and how excited they were to potentially sign up for it. I sat with my knees to my chest and smiled, thinking, "Pay no attention to the monster over here who would rather jump out a window than teach children again." The instructor facilitating the training mentioned how she had done the training as well and how, after she did her practicum, realized that teaching yoga to young children was just not for her. It took every ounce of my self-control not to immediately shout out, "Oh thank God," in some weird form of relief. The instructor then went on to talk about potential life changes and offered everyone a chance to talk about the changes they wanted to see this year. I kept silent, because I knew I ran the risk of crying if I had even attempted to put in my two cents.
Technically, my big life change was last year. But the change for this year includes not feeling guilt over burning out. Yoga is all about accepting who you are without judgment, letting go of those expectations of what you or other people think you should or shouldn't be doing. And that means accepting that the part of me that got a thrill from singing out the alphabet song to a group of 3-year-olds has been affected by the realities of life. It means understanding that the energy of a room changes when you shift from a group of adults to a group of kids, and that it's okay to gravitate to one while avoiding the other. You do exactly what you need to do in order to live out your life properly and you follow exactly what you need to follow in order to properly give back to the world. You have to do what feels right, what feels authentic, and what feels healthy. And there's nothing healthy about trying to lead a group of children when your knee jerk response is to run off and dry heave.
In short: I'm a former preschool teacher turning tai chi and (soon to be) yoga instructor -- and I won't feel guilty about not teaching children's tai chi or yoga.
Monday, April 7, 2014
Sunday, April 6, 2014
Day 244 of 365: A Few Thoughts, Post-Practicum
I technically taught my first yoga class on Saturday.
I say, "technically" because:
1) I've been technically teaching yoga to my husband and to my cats (although, let's be real: to myself. Little bastards never get out of corpse pose).
2) It was part of a group practicum where the students were fellow trainees.
Regardless, it was a trip, walking around the room and giving adjustments when it wasn't my turn to run the sequence. It was equally a trip to go to the front of the studio and run the last bits of the sequence. I slipped into that "tai chi me" I discussed a million years back, ignoring the fact that my heart was in my throat and my face was flushed like you wouldn't believe, and started leading the class.
Apparently our sequence was a hit. As one of my classmates joked, "Your voice is so soothing, we were ready to do whatever you said. 'Now, just follow the lemmings off of the cliff...'" Which, for me, is a huge, huge compliment. My favorite yoga teachers -- both in person and on YouTube -- have one thing in common: a calm, soothing voice that lulls you just as much as the sequence does.
Of course, we're far from out of the woods: we are only halfway through the training, and there's a much larger practicum waiting for us. And there certainly is a difference between joking through a sequence with your smart-aleck husband/a room full of sleeping cats and actually leading a class with students who are relying on you to provide them with a great physical and mental experience. But the feedback from my first stab at it really has been great. And needed. Even though I've been making huge strides in terms of my career with writing, even though my tai chi class (classes - holy shit, we're getting back into the plural again), I'm still a little shaky with this post-preschool-teaching life. We're closing in on a year since I left and there's still some things I got to sort out. Hopefully leaving the ECE world behind is the closest I ever get to a divorce, because, damn, it certainly felt like one.
As I see it, yoga was there for me when early education was getting the better of me. When I walked into our brand new house with a vibrant blue hallway and beige den, I walked right back out and into my favorite yoga studio (after, y'know, crying and handing my phone over to my husband so he could email the painters). Yoga was there for me when I recognized some unhealthy thoughts patterns -- some obvious, some not so obvious -- that I had picked up along the way, especially while growing up. If I can provide some of that to even one person, then I know I'm on the right path.
Our yoga class's theme was "letting go of expectations". I paraphrased something I use in my tai chi classes ("there is always something to learn in tai chi. So where you are on that path is irrelevant, so long as you're moving forward") after demonstrating a fairly difficult apex pose. The classmates appreciated the reminder that we don't have to do the craziest poses in its fullest expression, that we just have to do what's right for us. And it's a reminder I need from time to time as well. I don't have to already be at the finish line. So long as I am on the path, I'm doing a-okay.
I say, "technically" because:
1) I've been technically teaching yoga to my husband and to my cats (although, let's be real: to myself. Little bastards never get out of corpse pose).
2) It was part of a group practicum where the students were fellow trainees.
Regardless, it was a trip, walking around the room and giving adjustments when it wasn't my turn to run the sequence. It was equally a trip to go to the front of the studio and run the last bits of the sequence. I slipped into that "tai chi me" I discussed a million years back, ignoring the fact that my heart was in my throat and my face was flushed like you wouldn't believe, and started leading the class.
Apparently our sequence was a hit. As one of my classmates joked, "Your voice is so soothing, we were ready to do whatever you said. 'Now, just follow the lemmings off of the cliff...'" Which, for me, is a huge, huge compliment. My favorite yoga teachers -- both in person and on YouTube -- have one thing in common: a calm, soothing voice that lulls you just as much as the sequence does.
Of course, we're far from out of the woods: we are only halfway through the training, and there's a much larger practicum waiting for us. And there certainly is a difference between joking through a sequence with your smart-aleck husband/a room full of sleeping cats and actually leading a class with students who are relying on you to provide them with a great physical and mental experience. But the feedback from my first stab at it really has been great. And needed. Even though I've been making huge strides in terms of my career with writing, even though my tai chi class (classes - holy shit, we're getting back into the plural again), I'm still a little shaky with this post-preschool-teaching life. We're closing in on a year since I left and there's still some things I got to sort out. Hopefully leaving the ECE world behind is the closest I ever get to a divorce, because, damn, it certainly felt like one.
As I see it, yoga was there for me when early education was getting the better of me. When I walked into our brand new house with a vibrant blue hallway and beige den, I walked right back out and into my favorite yoga studio (after, y'know, crying and handing my phone over to my husband so he could email the painters). Yoga was there for me when I recognized some unhealthy thoughts patterns -- some obvious, some not so obvious -- that I had picked up along the way, especially while growing up. If I can provide some of that to even one person, then I know I'm on the right path.
Our yoga class's theme was "letting go of expectations". I paraphrased something I use in my tai chi classes ("there is always something to learn in tai chi. So where you are on that path is irrelevant, so long as you're moving forward") after demonstrating a fairly difficult apex pose. The classmates appreciated the reminder that we don't have to do the craziest poses in its fullest expression, that we just have to do what's right for us. And it's a reminder I need from time to time as well. I don't have to already be at the finish line. So long as I am on the path, I'm doing a-okay.
Saturday, April 5, 2014
Day 243 of 365: Girls, It's Time To Stop Saying You're "Not Like Other Girls"
And since I'm all about the opinions these day:
Lady, women, young female adults: it's time to stop saying you're "not like other girls".
It's tempting, I know. Look at the stereotype we are presented with: this hysterical, irrational, pink-loving shopaholic who gossips about her friends and gets super jealous and nitpicks every move of her boyfriends and doesn't get that whole "sport" thing (lol!). Unless you're fulfilling that very stereotype, you'd want as far away from it as possible.
I've been there. Trust me, I've been there. I took pride when I was younger about "not like being other girls". I ran track and loved college & professional hockey and preferred climbing trees & disappearing into nature over retail therapy. I rarely wore pink and I could hold my own in a chat about mixed martial arts. I hated romantic comedies and cheered when things blew up in movies. I never got jealous if I were in a room with a woman who was prettier or skinnier than me. My circle of friends was equally populated by both boys and girls. Man, how not like other girls was I!
But let's be 100% clear, here: there were few things as self-involved as me proclaiming I wasn't like other girls. Self-involved, incorrect, and downright harmful to the female gender as a whole.
It's downright instinctual to want to elevate our status as the expense of others. But what are we saying when we say, "I'm not like other girls."? We're confirming that nasty stereotype: that personality trait that is true for maybe 5% of the population, we confirm as 95%. We indirectly state that most women are undesirable messes, and thank God we're not one of them.
But that can't be further from the truth. The same way women make up 40% of the sports fandom world, the same way women come in all shapes and sizes and reactions. It's time we own this "girl"ness, recognizing fully that it can fall anywhere on the spectrum. That there's nothing wrong with loving pink, or with loving anything but the color pink. That we're so much more than our stereotypes.
To be frank, it's about time we got over ourselves. Because, statistically speaking, we are like other girls. And we're like no one else at the same time, too.
Lady, women, young female adults: it's time to stop saying you're "not like other girls".
It's tempting, I know. Look at the stereotype we are presented with: this hysterical, irrational, pink-loving shopaholic who gossips about her friends and gets super jealous and nitpicks every move of her boyfriends and doesn't get that whole "sport" thing (lol!). Unless you're fulfilling that very stereotype, you'd want as far away from it as possible.
I've been there. Trust me, I've been there. I took pride when I was younger about "not like being other girls". I ran track and loved college & professional hockey and preferred climbing trees & disappearing into nature over retail therapy. I rarely wore pink and I could hold my own in a chat about mixed martial arts. I hated romantic comedies and cheered when things blew up in movies. I never got jealous if I were in a room with a woman who was prettier or skinnier than me. My circle of friends was equally populated by both boys and girls. Man, how not like other girls was I!
But let's be 100% clear, here: there were few things as self-involved as me proclaiming I wasn't like other girls. Self-involved, incorrect, and downright harmful to the female gender as a whole.
It's downright instinctual to want to elevate our status as the expense of others. But what are we saying when we say, "I'm not like other girls."? We're confirming that nasty stereotype: that personality trait that is true for maybe 5% of the population, we confirm as 95%. We indirectly state that most women are undesirable messes, and thank God we're not one of them.
But that can't be further from the truth. The same way women make up 40% of the sports fandom world, the same way women come in all shapes and sizes and reactions. It's time we own this "girl"ness, recognizing fully that it can fall anywhere on the spectrum. That there's nothing wrong with loving pink, or with loving anything but the color pink. That we're so much more than our stereotypes.
To be frank, it's about time we got over ourselves. Because, statistically speaking, we are like other girls. And we're like no one else at the same time, too.
Friday, April 4, 2014
Day 242 of 365: Dear People Who Correct Those Who Say, "I'm Good": You're Wrong.
Okay, this seriously needs to stop.
To the people who ask how someone is doing, only to immediate attack their, "I'm good," statement -- to the people who dust off their pseudo-grammarian caps and go, "Don't you mean I'm well?": Cut it the fuck out. Because you're wrong.
Let's break it down: "good" is an adjective. "Good" is not an adverb. Which is why saying, "We want to do good on the exam," is grammatically incorrect. Instead, we use "well", because "well" can be used as an adverb, as in, "We want to do well on the exam so we can get a good grade in the class."
Now, let's get back to that, "I'm good," statement. You asked how that person is today. Since you were so busy patting yourself on the back about correcting your friend's grammar, you probably didn't notice that, by asking, "How are you today?", you were asking about their state of being. And when said person said, "I'm good," they are letting you know that their state of being is good. And "state of being", while a fun, abstract concept that can send any philosopher and psychologist alike into a lifetime of research and debate, is, for all intents and purposes, a noun.
And what do we use to describe nouns? Adjectives.
Crazy idea, I know! "Good" is not an adverb, and yet we can still use it as an adjective. Someone alert the presses, because this news is going to rock modern society as we know it.
Think of it this way: "goodly", while a horribly outdated word, is still grammatically correct. It can also be used as an adjective, but that's a convoluted tale for another time. Imagine how ridiculous you would sound if you corrected a friend's "grammar" by saying, "Don't you mean, 'I'm goodly'???"
You could say, "I'm doing goodly" and be grammatically correct, although you'll definitely get a few looks from the people listening to you. By the same token, "I'm doing good," is grammatically incorrect, unless they're trying to tell you they are doing good deeds and got lazy by the end of the sentence.
However, this is not to say that "I'm well," is incorrect. It just means, "I'm the opposite of sick," in this instance. And hey, sometimes people really want to let you know that you won't die of the plague by being around them. That's good info to know.
But, all joking aside, let's really get at the meat of why you are correcting your friend's grammar -- and correcting it incorrectly: you are taking a usually-innocuous set of pleasantries as a chance to prove how "intelligent" you are. You're not hoping to educate them on an important matter. You're not hoping to help them sound "smarter"; you're hoping to show them that you know something that they don't know. And the part that really gets under my skin is that you didn't even take the time to go on Google for 10 seconds to make sure you were correct. You were too busy congratulating yourself for being smart to actually look into the matter in the first place.
And regardless: unless you're part of the Totalitarian Grammar Society and your club is having a cocktail party, there's no reason to be correcting anyone's grammar in day-to-day conversations. Who cares if your friend or family member responded with, "I'm good," or "I'm doing good," or "I'm a goodly-good-good-doer with good on the goodly mind!"
Okay, that last one might be a sign that they're due for an evaluation. But aside from that, there is genuinely no reason to nitpick. It's the same reason why I bite my tongue (and silently hope that they'll eventually pay attention to that red dotted line under the word) when people spell ridiculous with an "e". Unless you're proofreading a paper or helping someone write a cover letter, it's mean-spirited to interrupt the flow of a conversation to "correct" someone. I don't care how good (or well/not sick) your intentions were; if you're willing to do that to someone you know -- or worse, someone you just met -- then, at least on some level, you consider yourself superior to them (or you wish you were superior to them in some way). The fact that you are incorrect in your correction makes it just that much worse.
So try it: next time you ask someone how they are, just listen. Even if, "I'm good," is just another insipid line in an arbitrary script that lets other people know just how social we are. Listen to them say, "I'm good," respond back if they ask how you are doing, and -- crazy concept, I know -- enjoy their conversation and company.
Because, seriously, the next person who tries to "correct" my grammar is getting the boot. Or, since the weather is finally warming up, the flip-flop.
To the people who ask how someone is doing, only to immediate attack their, "I'm good," statement -- to the people who dust off their pseudo-grammarian caps and go, "Don't you mean I'm well?": Cut it the fuck out. Because you're wrong.
Let's break it down: "good" is an adjective. "Good" is not an adverb. Which is why saying, "We want to do good on the exam," is grammatically incorrect. Instead, we use "well", because "well" can be used as an adverb, as in, "We want to do well on the exam so we can get a good grade in the class."
Now, let's get back to that, "I'm good," statement. You asked how that person is today. Since you were so busy patting yourself on the back about correcting your friend's grammar, you probably didn't notice that, by asking, "How are you today?", you were asking about their state of being. And when said person said, "I'm good," they are letting you know that their state of being is good. And "state of being", while a fun, abstract concept that can send any philosopher and psychologist alike into a lifetime of research and debate, is, for all intents and purposes, a noun.
And what do we use to describe nouns? Adjectives.
Crazy idea, I know! "Good" is not an adverb, and yet we can still use it as an adjective. Someone alert the presses, because this news is going to rock modern society as we know it.
Think of it this way: "goodly", while a horribly outdated word, is still grammatically correct. It can also be used as an adjective, but that's a convoluted tale for another time. Imagine how ridiculous you would sound if you corrected a friend's "grammar" by saying, "Don't you mean, 'I'm goodly'???"
You could say, "I'm doing goodly" and be grammatically correct, although you'll definitely get a few looks from the people listening to you. By the same token, "I'm doing good," is grammatically incorrect, unless they're trying to tell you they are doing good deeds and got lazy by the end of the sentence.
However, this is not to say that "I'm well," is incorrect. It just means, "I'm the opposite of sick," in this instance. And hey, sometimes people really want to let you know that you won't die of the plague by being around them. That's good info to know.
But, all joking aside, let's really get at the meat of why you are correcting your friend's grammar -- and correcting it incorrectly: you are taking a usually-innocuous set of pleasantries as a chance to prove how "intelligent" you are. You're not hoping to educate them on an important matter. You're not hoping to help them sound "smarter"; you're hoping to show them that you know something that they don't know. And the part that really gets under my skin is that you didn't even take the time to go on Google for 10 seconds to make sure you were correct. You were too busy congratulating yourself for being smart to actually look into the matter in the first place.
And regardless: unless you're part of the Totalitarian Grammar Society and your club is having a cocktail party, there's no reason to be correcting anyone's grammar in day-to-day conversations. Who cares if your friend or family member responded with, "I'm good," or "I'm doing good," or "I'm a goodly-good-good-doer with good on the goodly mind!"
Okay, that last one might be a sign that they're due for an evaluation. But aside from that, there is genuinely no reason to nitpick. It's the same reason why I bite my tongue (and silently hope that they'll eventually pay attention to that red dotted line under the word) when people spell ridiculous with an "e". Unless you're proofreading a paper or helping someone write a cover letter, it's mean-spirited to interrupt the flow of a conversation to "correct" someone. I don't care how good (or well/not sick) your intentions were; if you're willing to do that to someone you know -- or worse, someone you just met -- then, at least on some level, you consider yourself superior to them (or you wish you were superior to them in some way). The fact that you are incorrect in your correction makes it just that much worse.
So try it: next time you ask someone how they are, just listen. Even if, "I'm good," is just another insipid line in an arbitrary script that lets other people know just how social we are. Listen to them say, "I'm good," respond back if they ask how you are doing, and -- crazy concept, I know -- enjoy their conversation and company.
Because, seriously, the next person who tries to "correct" my grammar is getting the boot. Or, since the weather is finally warming up, the flip-flop.
Thursday, April 3, 2014
Day 241 of 365: We're Better When We Admit We're Not
Do you think you're a good person?
I don't. Well, not about you, anyway. I don't really know you (unless you're someone I know personally, in which case, wow, what a douchebag). But I know me. And I don't think I'm a good person.
In this paragraph, part of me is tempted to list all the reasons why I'm obviously not a not-good person. Do you know why that's the case? Because part of me is a narcissist who doesn't like being told that I'm anything other than a gem of generosity and friendship and kindness.
But notice that I use the term "not-good". I know I'm playing a semantics game by using it over "bad". But there's a huge distinction between "not being a good person" and "being a bad person". I don't think I'm some raging monster who has no right to live. But I recognize that I have those traits in me; traits that could easily come out in the right (or wrong) circumstances. Traits that we all have.
I've talked ad nauseum on this blog about human behavior and why all these great traits that helped our ancestors survive are what will be our undoing eventually. I've been taking this course through Princeton about evolutionary psychology that has all but confirmed all that babble, but that's for another time. The simple fact of the matter is that humans weren't designed to be good; we were designed to survive. And in a world that is "eat or be eat/beat or be beaten", saving our own skin can be at the cost of someone else's. For our ancestors, that was literal: kill that guy or he'll kill you. Wound and drive off that guy or he'll steal your resources. For us, that could mean screwing someone over for a promotion, cutting in line, swerving in and out of traffic, or sending a text message with words we have no right saying to any person in the first place.
That self-absorbed, narcissistic side of me would love to now veer this piece as far away from talking about me as possible, resting comfortably in the abstract "all of humanity/human condition". Yes, let's talk about how every human being is this way in some form and get the onus to talk about shitty human beings off of me. And that makes perfect sense: the early homosapiens who were quick to self-flagelate and admit their flaws were probably pretty low on the social ladder, if not excommunicated from their respective tribes altogether.
But, really, let's talk about me.
Because I genuinely don't think I'm a "good person". I have a volatile and irrational temper. I'm vain as all getout: I check myself in the mirror basically every time I walk past a reflective surface. I'm impatient and easily distractible and egocentric and I can hold onto a grudge in a way that would make my Irish ancestors proud. I can find myself in conversations and immediately wonder when I can jump in with my two cents. I get frustrated and flustered and my go-to response is to shut down when I can't sort it out.
So, what, does this mean I absolutely hate myself? God, no. Like I said: part of me is a narcissist. I could be the worst human being on the planet and still hold myself in high regard. But, in all seriousness, admitting all these things -- admitting that I'm not necessarily a "good person" -- does not mean I'm throwing myself on the train tracks out of despair. It just means that I recognize that thousands of thousands of years of evolution has brought me to this particular chemical makeup, this particular set of personality traits and responses and triggers. My brain -- my emotions, my thoughts and feelings -- are set up for survival the same way my skeletal structure and internal organs are set up for survival. And survival does not really care about "good"ness.
I'm not inherently a good person; the same way everyone isn't inherently a good person. But there's the crazy part: (almost) everyone has the inherent drive to be good. We might have the capability resting dormant in us to, say, punch out an old lady for the last package of Dasani, or say something we know will make someone else cry, but we also have this relentless drive to at least try to be a good person. Granted, it's pretty easy to see from an evolutionary perspective why such a drive is useful: those who had no desire to be good were quickly branded sociopaths (or whatever term they would use back then) and casted out. And every single "good" action we do can eventually be tied back to a selfish, egocentric reason ("I do this good thing because it feels good to do it." "I don't do this bad thing because it feels bad to do it."). But the drive is still there.
I have absolutely no evidence to back this up (other than my own firsthand accounts), but I contend that something changes when we let go of this attitude that "I am a good person" and embrace the fact that it's a lot more complicated than that. I've watched people do things they shouldn't do, say things they shouldn't say, and then downright flail as they try to maintain that they are, at the heart of it all, "good people". What would happen if we just admitted that, yes, we sometimes do shitty things. We're selfish and aggressive and irrational. We'll do things we end up regretting. And why? Because we're not good people, but we have the drive to be.
There is something incredibly freeing in admitting it. I know people will disagree with my sentiment, and that's okay: it's human nature to disagree, sometimes to the point of indignation. And sometimes people are better off holding onto the concept that they're good people, regardless as to how true that statement is. And sometimes we're better people by admitting that we're not as good as we think we are.
I don't. Well, not about you, anyway. I don't really know you (unless you're someone I know personally, in which case, wow, what a douchebag). But I know me. And I don't think I'm a good person.
In this paragraph, part of me is tempted to list all the reasons why I'm obviously not a not-good person. Do you know why that's the case? Because part of me is a narcissist who doesn't like being told that I'm anything other than a gem of generosity and friendship and kindness.
But notice that I use the term "not-good". I know I'm playing a semantics game by using it over "bad". But there's a huge distinction between "not being a good person" and "being a bad person". I don't think I'm some raging monster who has no right to live. But I recognize that I have those traits in me; traits that could easily come out in the right (or wrong) circumstances. Traits that we all have.
I've talked ad nauseum on this blog about human behavior and why all these great traits that helped our ancestors survive are what will be our undoing eventually. I've been taking this course through Princeton about evolutionary psychology that has all but confirmed all that babble, but that's for another time. The simple fact of the matter is that humans weren't designed to be good; we were designed to survive. And in a world that is "eat or be eat/beat or be beaten", saving our own skin can be at the cost of someone else's. For our ancestors, that was literal: kill that guy or he'll kill you. Wound and drive off that guy or he'll steal your resources. For us, that could mean screwing someone over for a promotion, cutting in line, swerving in and out of traffic, or sending a text message with words we have no right saying to any person in the first place.
That self-absorbed, narcissistic side of me would love to now veer this piece as far away from talking about me as possible, resting comfortably in the abstract "all of humanity/human condition". Yes, let's talk about how every human being is this way in some form and get the onus to talk about shitty human beings off of me. And that makes perfect sense: the early homosapiens who were quick to self-flagelate and admit their flaws were probably pretty low on the social ladder, if not excommunicated from their respective tribes altogether.
But, really, let's talk about me.
Because I genuinely don't think I'm a "good person". I have a volatile and irrational temper. I'm vain as all getout: I check myself in the mirror basically every time I walk past a reflective surface. I'm impatient and easily distractible and egocentric and I can hold onto a grudge in a way that would make my Irish ancestors proud. I can find myself in conversations and immediately wonder when I can jump in with my two cents. I get frustrated and flustered and my go-to response is to shut down when I can't sort it out.
So, what, does this mean I absolutely hate myself? God, no. Like I said: part of me is a narcissist. I could be the worst human being on the planet and still hold myself in high regard. But, in all seriousness, admitting all these things -- admitting that I'm not necessarily a "good person" -- does not mean I'm throwing myself on the train tracks out of despair. It just means that I recognize that thousands of thousands of years of evolution has brought me to this particular chemical makeup, this particular set of personality traits and responses and triggers. My brain -- my emotions, my thoughts and feelings -- are set up for survival the same way my skeletal structure and internal organs are set up for survival. And survival does not really care about "good"ness.
I'm not inherently a good person; the same way everyone isn't inherently a good person. But there's the crazy part: (almost) everyone has the inherent drive to be good. We might have the capability resting dormant in us to, say, punch out an old lady for the last package of Dasani, or say something we know will make someone else cry, but we also have this relentless drive to at least try to be a good person. Granted, it's pretty easy to see from an evolutionary perspective why such a drive is useful: those who had no desire to be good were quickly branded sociopaths (or whatever term they would use back then) and casted out. And every single "good" action we do can eventually be tied back to a selfish, egocentric reason ("I do this good thing because it feels good to do it." "I don't do this bad thing because it feels bad to do it."). But the drive is still there.
I have absolutely no evidence to back this up (other than my own firsthand accounts), but I contend that something changes when we let go of this attitude that "I am a good person" and embrace the fact that it's a lot more complicated than that. I've watched people do things they shouldn't do, say things they shouldn't say, and then downright flail as they try to maintain that they are, at the heart of it all, "good people". What would happen if we just admitted that, yes, we sometimes do shitty things. We're selfish and aggressive and irrational. We'll do things we end up regretting. And why? Because we're not good people, but we have the drive to be.
There is something incredibly freeing in admitting it. I know people will disagree with my sentiment, and that's okay: it's human nature to disagree, sometimes to the point of indignation. And sometimes people are better off holding onto the concept that they're good people, regardless as to how true that statement is. And sometimes we're better people by admitting that we're not as good as we think we are.
Wednesday, April 2, 2014
Day 240 of 365: A Boost
To say the finale of How I Met Your Mother affected me would be an understatement. I probably played those last scenes in my head a million times that night. I mean, this show has been on the air since before Isaac and I met; watching HIMYM has essentially been a part of our relationship since day one. It was enough for me to write yesterday's blog post at 6 in the morning (because if there is anything that ever gets put on the chopping block for whatever reason, it's my sleep). I polished it up, fixed a few grammatical errors, and sent it to Medium (which, let's be honest here, is Tumblr for intellectuals) and Thought Catalog.
To backtrack, I got spoiled rotten with my Motherhood and Teacher essays on TC. Have a few essays go viral and suddenly everything needs to be a hit. Never mind the type of traffic TC gets. Never mind that even articles on Buzzfeed or Huffington Post are lucky to get a thousand or two shares. It was irking me that my essays would getting a handful of shares and maybe a comment or two.
Of course, it helps that I was writing about pop culture events (emotional essay about dealing with the meaning of life after a friend's mother's passing? Whatever. Essay about a show's finale? ALL the love). But I woke up to one of my most popular essays since, well, the Motherhood essay.
All writers have a bit of narcissism in them. While they write "with the door closed" as Stephen King would say, at the end of the day, we're looking for people to pay attention to our writing. And when we get a sudden influx of attention (for crying out loud, Clutch Magazine ran a piece about my Motherhood essay), only to have it drop off with our other work, it's discouraging.
So, for me, this boost is huge, in so many ways. Yes, it's nice to get a bit of recognition from complete strangers. But it's a reminder that I'm not a complete doofus for devoting so much time to this particular craft. My writing is why I haven't gone on Monster.com and picked up the first administrative assistant position I can find. I can shrug my shoulders and say it's because of my tai chi teaching, my yoga classes, my sporadic go-sees and occasional modeling jobs. But the reality is, is that I'm not focusing on getting that ~big break~ in modeling before I have kids. I'm not focusing on opening my own studio before I have kids. But I am focusing on maybe -- just maybe -- getting a book deal before I have kids. Finishing that third manuscript (which I just get such a good feeling about) before I have kids. I know that having children doesn't necessarily mean, "THE END OF ALL THE GOOD THINGS FOR YOU AS AN ADULT." But it's a goal. The same way running this year's Chicago Marathon is a goal.
So I plan on riding this bit of extra attention as I continue to plow through Manuscript #3 (which is so stupidly close to the end, but I'm at all the parts I can't rush through -- something I can talk about on a later post) and feel just a little bit better about the fact that I'm essentially the New Hampshire version of NYC Trust Fund Babies trying to "make it as a writer".
To backtrack, I got spoiled rotten with my Motherhood and Teacher essays on TC. Have a few essays go viral and suddenly everything needs to be a hit. Never mind the type of traffic TC gets. Never mind that even articles on Buzzfeed or Huffington Post are lucky to get a thousand or two shares. It was irking me that my essays would getting a handful of shares and maybe a comment or two.
Of course, it helps that I was writing about pop culture events (emotional essay about dealing with the meaning of life after a friend's mother's passing? Whatever. Essay about a show's finale? ALL the love). But I woke up to one of my most popular essays since, well, the Motherhood essay.
All writers have a bit of narcissism in them. While they write "with the door closed" as Stephen King would say, at the end of the day, we're looking for people to pay attention to our writing. And when we get a sudden influx of attention (for crying out loud, Clutch Magazine ran a piece about my Motherhood essay), only to have it drop off with our other work, it's discouraging.
So, for me, this boost is huge, in so many ways. Yes, it's nice to get a bit of recognition from complete strangers. But it's a reminder that I'm not a complete doofus for devoting so much time to this particular craft. My writing is why I haven't gone on Monster.com and picked up the first administrative assistant position I can find. I can shrug my shoulders and say it's because of my tai chi teaching, my yoga classes, my sporadic go-sees and occasional modeling jobs. But the reality is, is that I'm not focusing on getting that ~big break~ in modeling before I have kids. I'm not focusing on opening my own studio before I have kids. But I am focusing on maybe -- just maybe -- getting a book deal before I have kids. Finishing that third manuscript (which I just get such a good feeling about) before I have kids. I know that having children doesn't necessarily mean, "THE END OF ALL THE GOOD THINGS FOR YOU AS AN ADULT." But it's a goal. The same way running this year's Chicago Marathon is a goal.
So I plan on riding this bit of extra attention as I continue to plow through Manuscript #3 (which is so stupidly close to the end, but I'm at all the parts I can't rush through -- something I can talk about on a later post) and feel just a little bit better about the fact that I'm essentially the New Hampshire version of NYC Trust Fund Babies trying to "make it as a writer".
Tuesday, April 1, 2014
Day 239 of 365: Five Things From the HIMYM Finale That Were Actually True to Life
I remember when How I Met Your Mother first came out. To say I wasn't an instant fan is an understatement. In fact, I spent half of the first season avoiding it because I saw the synopses of the first handful of episodes ("Man realizes he needs to get serious about dating"/"Best friend proposes to his fiancée/"Financée has doubts about her life") and all I could think was, "Man, yet another show that falls into the clichéd trope of man falls for his best friend's fiancée."
Man, I couldn't have been more wrong.
One of the things I loved about How I Met Your Mother (at least, at first) was the fact that it portrayed the adult world without super-glamorizing it. It held no punches as relationships floundered, as career aspirations floundered, as each character dealt with disappointment (because, let's face it, "disappointment" and "the real world" go hand in hand sometimes). My heart broke when Marshall came to terms with the fact that he didn't meet the goals he set for himself as a freshman in college. I felt for Robin when she struggled to make it as a journalist, only to get assigned mediocre tasks that got her no where. I wanted to cry when I listened to Lily admit that sometimes she didn't want to be a mom, that sometimes it was too much to be a teacher and come home to take care of yet more children. You understood just a little too well when Ted and Robin broke up because it was clear that their relationship had an expiration date.
Now, do not get me wrong: this show got silly in its last few seasons. All shows do. I'm hard-pressed to think of any show over 7 seasons that didn't jump the shark in some way. But the finale, while garnering mixed reviews, reminded us that this show can provide that mirror to the way the world works. Maybe it's because the ending was written in Season One (with Ted very obviously acting against very old footage), but there was a lot to this episode that is very much true to real life:
1. People get divorced. Barney and Robin were not meant to be together. We knew this from the first time they tried to do a relationship. They have the chemistry, but not that extra little something to make it work. And, even though an entire farking season was devoted to their wedding, three years later, they realize that it's no longer working. And they get divorced.
There's no plate-throwing or name-calling. Just a mutual realization that they're dragging each other down and an understanding that, while they love each other, they're at the end of the road. Because divorce happens. It takes a very specific type of relationship dynamic to make it work over a lifetime. The world is filled with more "Barney/Robin"s then they are of "Marshal/Lily"s.
2. Tight-knit groups drift apart. It's a hard truth about adulthood. The real world has a funny way of isolating you from even the closest groups of friends. You can declare as loud as you want that you'll "totally be friends forever!" At the end of the day, life happens. People move away. People raise kids. Suddenly, that group of friends you had -- the ones you met with nearly every day for a drink -- becomes the smattering of people you "catch up with" from time to time.
3. Life isn't always super-orthodox. Ted meets the Mother, Ted proposes to the Mother, Ted plans this incredible wedding in a 17th century castle. The wedding is then canceled. Why? Because the Mother finds out she is pregnant. Seven years and two kids later, they finally tie the knot -- a wedding that was perpetually put off because of work, kids, and -- oh hey -- life.
We're so used to the main character, when he or she finally finds the Love of Their Life, to do everything in the "correct" order: marriage, house, kids, and so on, and so forth. But sometimes you don't go down that orthodox path. And that's okay. It's no longer 1954; we recognize that there are other ways to live your life outside of the Cleaver Lifestyle.
4. People get sick. Now, do not get me wrong: how this storyline was handled was incredibly problematic. From the fact that we just find out "she's sick" and nothing else, to the fact that we have this bit of information thrown on us just minutes before another bombshell... I mean, for crying out loud, we spent an entire farking season on the week before a wedding, with more time-wasters than you could shake a stick at, and they give us thirty seconds to digest this bit of information? Nah, kid. Nah. That ain't fahkin' okay.
But it's the sad truth: being someone's The One -- being the entire reason this show is on in the first place -- is not enough to stop things like cancer. It's not enough to be diagnosed with a degenerative disease. Lymphoma doesn't care if you're a mother of two. Breast Cancer is indifferent to who you are as a person. And the really heartbreaking truth is that people don't always get better. Sometimes people get diagnosed, fight the good fight, and succumb. No amount of prayers or hope or "good energy" will stop it. And it sucks. The hardest realization about life is that it ends. For everyone. And sometimes a loved one's number is called up a lot sooner than you expected.
5. Life goes on after death. Again, do not get me wrong: how this storyline was handled was incredibly problematic. We spent nine flippin' seasons being told why Robin and Ted wouldn't actually work out. We listen to this incredibly intricate story about Ted's life, only to find out that he's only telling it as an subconscious way to get his children's permission to date Robin (and what 14-year-old girl is so flippant about her dad's sex life? "Yeah, my mom died, but that was, like, totally six years ago. Having that happen when I was eight totally didn't shape my entire schema about life and parenting. You totes want to bang your friend.") To say it left a gnarly taste in a lot of fan's mouths is a bit of an understatement.
But, really, that's how life is. It goes on. And, yeah, the sad truth is, is that Ted and Robin probably still won't work out. And that this relationship is basically both party's second choice. But this dating story is very similar to so many other dating stories of divorcés/widows/widowers in their 50s. This recognition that life is not a fairy tale, and sometimes True Love isn't Forever Love -- at least not while on Earth -- and a downright blind stab at companionship again. I'm sure some fangirls want this to be proof that "yes they were truly meant to be together!" But the reality of the situation is that it's a man just trying to find love again.
This show wasn't perfect. The finale was far from perfect (and we never found out what happened with that goat!) But there's a reason why this show had such a loyal following. There are a million shows out there with enough "one true love" storylines to make even Hallmark want to vomit. I contend that what made this show so special was because, at the end of the day, it was just five friends trying to figure it all out, only to realize that you never have it all figured out. Maybe you'll end up like Lily/Marshall. Maybe you'll end up like Barney. Maybe you'll be like Ted/Traci. I don't see anyone stealing a blue horn for the third time in real life (and, really, are we seriously supposed to believe that the restaurant stayed in business that long? In this economy?), but the finale reminded us that real life provides us with some of the most dynamic storylines of all.
Man, I couldn't have been more wrong.
One of the things I loved about How I Met Your Mother (at least, at first) was the fact that it portrayed the adult world without super-glamorizing it. It held no punches as relationships floundered, as career aspirations floundered, as each character dealt with disappointment (because, let's face it, "disappointment" and "the real world" go hand in hand sometimes). My heart broke when Marshall came to terms with the fact that he didn't meet the goals he set for himself as a freshman in college. I felt for Robin when she struggled to make it as a journalist, only to get assigned mediocre tasks that got her no where. I wanted to cry when I listened to Lily admit that sometimes she didn't want to be a mom, that sometimes it was too much to be a teacher and come home to take care of yet more children. You understood just a little too well when Ted and Robin broke up because it was clear that their relationship had an expiration date.
Now, do not get me wrong: this show got silly in its last few seasons. All shows do. I'm hard-pressed to think of any show over 7 seasons that didn't jump the shark in some way. But the finale, while garnering mixed reviews, reminded us that this show can provide that mirror to the way the world works. Maybe it's because the ending was written in Season One (with Ted very obviously acting against very old footage), but there was a lot to this episode that is very much true to real life:
1. People get divorced. Barney and Robin were not meant to be together. We knew this from the first time they tried to do a relationship. They have the chemistry, but not that extra little something to make it work. And, even though an entire farking season was devoted to their wedding, three years later, they realize that it's no longer working. And they get divorced.
There's no plate-throwing or name-calling. Just a mutual realization that they're dragging each other down and an understanding that, while they love each other, they're at the end of the road. Because divorce happens. It takes a very specific type of relationship dynamic to make it work over a lifetime. The world is filled with more "Barney/Robin"s then they are of "Marshal/Lily"s.
2. Tight-knit groups drift apart. It's a hard truth about adulthood. The real world has a funny way of isolating you from even the closest groups of friends. You can declare as loud as you want that you'll "totally be friends forever!" At the end of the day, life happens. People move away. People raise kids. Suddenly, that group of friends you had -- the ones you met with nearly every day for a drink -- becomes the smattering of people you "catch up with" from time to time.
3. Life isn't always super-orthodox. Ted meets the Mother, Ted proposes to the Mother, Ted plans this incredible wedding in a 17th century castle. The wedding is then canceled. Why? Because the Mother finds out she is pregnant. Seven years and two kids later, they finally tie the knot -- a wedding that was perpetually put off because of work, kids, and -- oh hey -- life.
We're so used to the main character, when he or she finally finds the Love of Their Life, to do everything in the "correct" order: marriage, house, kids, and so on, and so forth. But sometimes you don't go down that orthodox path. And that's okay. It's no longer 1954; we recognize that there are other ways to live your life outside of the Cleaver Lifestyle.
4. People get sick. Now, do not get me wrong: how this storyline was handled was incredibly problematic. From the fact that we just find out "she's sick" and nothing else, to the fact that we have this bit of information thrown on us just minutes before another bombshell... I mean, for crying out loud, we spent an entire farking season on the week before a wedding, with more time-wasters than you could shake a stick at, and they give us thirty seconds to digest this bit of information? Nah, kid. Nah. That ain't fahkin' okay.
But it's the sad truth: being someone's The One -- being the entire reason this show is on in the first place -- is not enough to stop things like cancer. It's not enough to be diagnosed with a degenerative disease. Lymphoma doesn't care if you're a mother of two. Breast Cancer is indifferent to who you are as a person. And the really heartbreaking truth is that people don't always get better. Sometimes people get diagnosed, fight the good fight, and succumb. No amount of prayers or hope or "good energy" will stop it. And it sucks. The hardest realization about life is that it ends. For everyone. And sometimes a loved one's number is called up a lot sooner than you expected.
5. Life goes on after death. Again, do not get me wrong: how this storyline was handled was incredibly problematic. We spent nine flippin' seasons being told why Robin and Ted wouldn't actually work out. We listen to this incredibly intricate story about Ted's life, only to find out that he's only telling it as an subconscious way to get his children's permission to date Robin (and what 14-year-old girl is so flippant about her dad's sex life? "Yeah, my mom died, but that was, like, totally six years ago. Having that happen when I was eight totally didn't shape my entire schema about life and parenting. You totes want to bang your friend.") To say it left a gnarly taste in a lot of fan's mouths is a bit of an understatement.
But, really, that's how life is. It goes on. And, yeah, the sad truth is, is that Ted and Robin probably still won't work out. And that this relationship is basically both party's second choice. But this dating story is very similar to so many other dating stories of divorcés/widows/widowers in their 50s. This recognition that life is not a fairy tale, and sometimes True Love isn't Forever Love -- at least not while on Earth -- and a downright blind stab at companionship again. I'm sure some fangirls want this to be proof that "yes they were truly meant to be together!" But the reality of the situation is that it's a man just trying to find love again.
This show wasn't perfect. The finale was far from perfect (and we never found out what happened with that goat!) But there's a reason why this show had such a loyal following. There are a million shows out there with enough "one true love" storylines to make even Hallmark want to vomit. I contend that what made this show so special was because, at the end of the day, it was just five friends trying to figure it all out, only to realize that you never have it all figured out. Maybe you'll end up like Lily/Marshall. Maybe you'll end up like Barney. Maybe you'll be like Ted/Traci. I don't see anyone stealing a blue horn for the third time in real life (and, really, are we seriously supposed to believe that the restaurant stayed in business that long? In this economy?), but the finale reminded us that real life provides us with some of the most dynamic storylines of all.
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