Hero-ing is Hard
I have an urge to juggle the balls of the entire world.
When I was growing up, I loved a rom-com called One Fine Day. In the movie, a couple of divorcées, Jack and Melanie, meet in chaotic circumstances when both of their respective exes bail on a their usual day to take the kids. They run into each other at the kids’ school and, naturally, they hate each other. He is rumpled, spontaneous and devil-may-care, and she is tailored, highly organized and practical. At one point in the movie, Melanie describes the organizational skills needed to be working mom as “juggling multiple balls.” Her character is constantely driven to manipulate and stamp out the chaos in her world. She quickly begins to see imperfections in Jack’s parenting, and to sanctimoniously solve them. Her reasoning: “ If you don’t want your balls juggled, don’t throw them in my face.”
Of course, chaos ensues, and she is unable to juggle all the balls.
I’m a lot like Melanie. I’m a champion ball-juggler. For much of my life, I’ve (mostly) avoided things that put me out of control, like drugs, alcohol or baking bread. This need for control has also made me a habitual over-thinker. I act slowly because my mind is racing with all the possible pros and cons of my life-choices and those of the people I love, so that I don’t disappoint anyone and I help everyone. It’s like there’s a little super-hero rabbit galloping around my mind, solving all the world’s problems, juggling all my balls, and trying to do the same for everyone else.
I appreciate the inner rabbit in some ways. He makes me good at my work as an educator and organizational coach, and he’s helped me achieve some difficult dreams: acceptance into a prestigious art school, living abroad on a shoe-string budget, and building my own business as the COVID-19 Pandemic shut other businesses down. Many people tell you that it takes motivation, perseverance and some luck to succeed, which is true. But what they don’t always mention is that it also means being ferociously, i.e. Melanie-level, organized. Despite the ball-juggling metaphor, organization just isn’t sexy. The rewards are worth it though. I’m glad I’m good at managing my world, and helping others manage theirs.
But, I’m also seeing ways my inner rabbit slows me down with his constant need to save the world. He’ll help everyone else, to the point of distraction, but will procrastinate when it comes to helping himself/myself. I’m just a little afraid that if I let go, I won’t ever get back in control and that my world will fall apart. For me, the world falling apart largely means disappointing others. It’s insidious because it is altruistic on the surface: if I don’t keep it together, others will suffer. The irony is that this behavior has caused me to burnout in recent years, leading to my own suffering and that of others too.
Like Melanie in the movie, I am learning to be less ferociously organized. I am learning to take a more active part in saving at least a part of myself, my energy and my time, and less so in saving others. This has meant stepping back, even from little things like organizing the extended family Christmas, engaging in extra volunteer work, or doing all the chores (because only I can do them correctly). It means taking time to think about, not only what I must do, but what I must not do as I plan my week. To do this, I have to be more proactive in trusting others more than I have in the past. It’s an active choice. It’s a mindful choice too. I have to recognize when I need to trust people to step up and organize their part in the world, so I can step back and rest.
There are some very easy-to-spot things that signal I need to let go: sleeplessness, tightness in my chest, and general feeling of not looking forward to the day. I think everyone has tells like this that, when they are persistent, signal it’s time to rest. Those are mine.
It’s an art to rest. I’m not super good at it, which is annoying because I like to be good at things. I can hear my inner rabbit now: “I must be the most perfect at relaxing!” But at least that vow drives me to do my variable best to relax. It’s humbling to step back, to be silent, to be less involved because many of my habits are ingrained around doing the opposite. As I type this now, I have to tamp down my awareness of the chores I did not do, the lessons I have not planned, and the text messages I didn’t respond to so that I could focus on my pet way to relax: writing. It’s a daily noticing of these tendencies and sometimes resisting them.
Maybe I’ll always have an inner rabbit, always fighting to do the hero-ing and juggle the balls people throw in my face. But at least I’ve met the rabbit now, and I can help him to sit down at his calendar and simplify his expectations of himself.
One day, he will accept the fact that he doesn’t need to juggle any balls but his own.
