My Near-Death Experience
Good morning Mate! And what a beautiful morning it is indeed! I am writing this as I sit on a bench overlooking a gorgeous creek. There are tumbling rapids below, a flock of geese playing and pruning among the shallows, and a melody of bird songs that can be heard above the gentle roar of the water. A bit of heaven I might say.
I didn’t bike into town today. I have some strange (hopefully soft tissue) damage in my left leg so I have taken the week off of hard exercise in hopes of healing. We shall see. The chiropractor and I are trying to solve this painful puzzle and I’ll be back in his office tomorrow morning to see if we are gaining any ground. I reckon this is how age 40 has decided to welcome me.
Speaking of getting older, I have taken on a new challenge in celebration of achieving my “40” status. I’ve always wanted to do something significant to prove that turning 40 doesn’t mean that my body will suddenly fall apart. (Are you listening left leg?) And as I type this I am starting to see that this whole recent weird injury may be just that but ya know, I’m not a quitter and I ain’t going down without a fight. Basically, I am still unwilling to believe that my injury has to do with age. Jennifer mentioned that maybe it has more to do with the fact that I expect a lot out of my body and this could be an opportunity to learn how to care for myself better. She’s probably right. As usual.
Anyways, back to my point: I decided to do a triathlon for my birthday this year. I can bike like a mad woman, and run like a wild woman, but ummm…well when it comes to swimming, let’s just say I can do a mean breaststroke and froggy kick. But come on; it can’t be that hard right? I should be able to stay alive during the swimming section. So as any smart and unprepared person would, I signed up.
It was only after I signed up and watched a couple of triathlon videos that I started to worry. What had I gotten myself into? I contacted a friend who does triathlons and she got me in touch with a friend of hers who trains people for triathlons. Perfect! The coach let me join her special group that trains together 5 weeks prior to the race. I was elated! I specified to her that I only know the breaststroke and she assured me that as long as I knew how to swim, she could teach me the rest. Shew!
Last night was our first practice. On the drive there I told Jennifer that I was nervous. She reminded me how brave I was and I told her I wasn’t feeling very brave. But as soon as I said that another thought hit me and I said “But I’m not sure if being brave has anything to do with 'feeling' brave. In fact,” I continued, “I would venture to say that if you feel brave, maybe that’s not actual bravery at all. Maybe the whole meaning of brave is when we are shit scared but we do the things anyway.” Jennifer wholeheartedly agreed and then I felt a little better. I had no idea how much I would need this little piece of insight to get me through what was about to unfold.
We met at a very nice, indoor pool inside a university. I was dressed in my triathlon outfit with my matching cap and goggles. The coach asked us all to just first do 4 laps however we felt most comfortable swimming. Thank god. “Okay, I can do this," I told myself and I hoped that my few practices in our gym exercise pool doing the breaststroke would pay off. 4 laps is a lot when you’re in a big pool like that. Just saying. On my last lap, she asked me to try the freestyle no matter how ugly it might look. I was confused and thought “freestyle” just meant to do what you want. So I thought to myself “Well I mean this is all I know how to do, so it’s not like I can pick something else cool to show you.” Then it hit me that she may be asking me to try “the crawl”, which is what I’ve always heard it called. So, when I got to the other side I asked if that was what she meant and she kindly said, “Yes, let me see what you got.” So there I went. I may have gotten in 4 strokes at best. If you can call it strokes. Basically, I flailed wildly, surfaced with a look of panic, and while choking on bleach water I spit out the words “I’m dying”. The trainer didn’t seem fazed at all even though I felt I had come within a lip's distance from death.
After this first drill, she started talking to all of us about technique, and the proper way to move in the water. My body started involuntarily shaking. I got goosebumps and my teeth started chattering. This happens when one of two things are going on: either my body is responding to trauma, or just sheer fear. In this case, I think it was both. Holy shit. I didn’t know this class was about being a triathlon swimmer. I was hoping to first learn how to swim! My mind was whirling, looking for a way out, wondering how I would stay alive, not to mention I felt like a complete idiot amidst people who all clearly knew how to freestyle swim. And then there’s me, who didn’t even know what “freestyle swimming” meant until a few minutes ago. I needed to have a talk with myself.
So I did. This is how it went: “Abigail. This is an amazing opportunity. Sure, it’s not ideal and you are being thrown into a SUPER uncomfortable, WAY OUT of your comfort zone situation, but just think about how good this is for your brain! Your brain thrives on learning new things and making new pathways! This is like the perfect storm! It’s new people, a new environment, and doing something you have never done, which all make it extremely scary. It’s okay that you’re scared. Remember that being brave is about still choosing to do the things that scare you. You’ve come this far. Don’t quit now. It’s your one shot at some amazing coaching. Engage your brain and give it your best effort. You will only grow and learn from this experience.”
And with that short pep talk, I nodded in agreement with my inner self and settled in with determination. Now was not the time to worry about how I looked. “The squeaky wheel gets the grease," or in my case, “the drowning woman gets more coaching.” :)
The next hour was filled with drills and practices. Back and forth. Back and forth. I quickly accepted the fact that I was always going to be the last one coming back from the lap, panting, choking, struggling to make all my limbs look like they belonged to my body, while everyone else chilled at the wall discussing techniques with the swim coach. I must say that I did surprise myself several times when I would attempt to put all the drills together and my body would actually move through the water. It gave me hope that with a lot of grit, determination, and not-so-pretty practice, I might someday actually get this thing.
The trainer was great though. She never made me feel like an idiot. I had to keep reminding myself that learning things we have never done meant being willing to look incredibly stupid. It’s part of the package. You can’t look finessed at something you have never attempted. (Unless you are Nate. Somehow he can manage to make almost anything look easy, goddammit.) But this blog isn’t about Nate. And anyway, he can’t ride a unicycle. So there.
Going back though, maybe it’s not that I look stupid when I try new things. Maybe I just look like a learner. An unpracticed person lacking the knowledge and experience it takes to execute the skill. And maybe this applies to all of life. It seems we expect ourselves to make new pathways in our brains, let go of unhealthy coping skills, and learn how to behave in new ways with flawless perfection. If you think about it, that’s rather silly. The reality is going to look a lot more like me attempting “the freestyle”; a whole lot of splashing, a whole lot of choking, a whole lot of fear, feeling as if you basically swam up the Niagra Falls, just to surface and realize you barely moved. But ... we all have to start somewhere. And, better to start with flopping and flailing than never start, right?
I’ve got some things to work on. I am happy to say that I got up early to go to the gym this morning to practice this new skill that I so badly want to achieve. But this experience also gives me some other things to think about that could benefit me even more and that is how to be a “learner”. Learners don’t look like pros. Learners don’t become pros unless they can embrace the truth that learning something new means for a while it’s going to look like a mess of mistakes.
Let’s redefine the word “mistake”. The first meaning of that word is “a wrong judgment”. But as we read down, it also means “inadequate knowledge or inattention”. Ahh ... there. That’s it. Inadequate knowledge or inattention. It’s something we haven’t had enough knowledge about or the ability to even see it. But as we go through life as learners, we become aware of areas we want to grow in, new skills we want to acquire, and old ones we no longer need. This is when we must allow ourselves space to make mistakes and flounder a bit as we learn a new way. It’s part of the learning process.
Now that I think of it, that is why we all love to watch a pro, any pro, doing their thing. Because we know it took an intense amount of grit, determination, and a buttload of mistakes to perfect whatever skill they achieved. It wouldn’t be impressive if it was easy and anyone could do it in the first or second try.
So this week my darling, I want you to remind yourself of that. By getting out there and choosing to be a “Life Learner” you are fucking amazing. And might I add, fucking brave? You keep that up and one day you’re going to be a pro, gliding down the swim lanes of life as if you are just taking a summer stroll through the park. At that point, you’ll know that it’s time to move on to learning something else. Just like the surging creek below me, always moving, always changing, and always looking for opportunities to forge new pathways.
Comments