My husband and I opened a CrossFit box with another couple and I suffered a fairly serious knee injury during an obstacle race in March. Running quickly ceased to be my main fitness focus, especially since I couldn't do it for six weeks. Once I started back it was slow going. I began to feel as though I had let myself down. The same old feelings of self-doubt that would creep in when a New Year's "resolution" of old didn't last were working their way back into my head. It didn't matter that once I began to heal I was actually performing better physically and beginning to look like I was in the best shape of my life. Thankfully, in the early fall, right when I realized there was no way to accomplish my goal for this year, I realized that I ALREADY HAD accomplished my goal for this year. Looking back at the runs I logged in my phone app, I saw that I had in fact beaten the 4 hour time I set as my 2013 goal in 2012. WHEW!
There is a woman I admire very much and like to call my friend (She lives in Connecticut; we met through dog training and now also have CrossFit in common.) that also sets an annual goal for herself. The difference between her goal and mine is that she stipulates that the goal must push her outside of her comfort zone. I think that's amazing and has the capacity to be both so simple and so complicated at the same time. That's why I'm adopting the idea. My goals in recent years have only been to improve at doing something I loved doing anyway. This year, my goal is to stop taking things so personally. Sound simple? You don't know me very well.
I always take things personally. As a young child, it was the problems in my family. As a student, it was an inability to maintain a job, a full class schedule, too many extra-curricular activities, and be everyone's friend. As a dog trainer, I took every lack of compliance by an owner personally, and I personally failed the few dogs that I trained that ended up needing to be rehomed. I can't even stand to think about the dogs that didn't make it in the professions that I originally mapped out for them. As an artist, I still take it personally when I feel too many revisions need to be made on a piece. I'm failing at capturing that "thing" on canvas or paper. As a runner and a martial arts student, it was not progressing quickly enough or not understanding the components or progression of a form or training plan. As a wife and mother, every less-than-stellar dinner, every time a week goes by that the vacuum cleaner isn't put to good use, and every challenge my son shies away from are personal failures. There are other things in the wife and mother departments that I take way too personally, but that would be an entire essay in and of itself. In CrossFit I take it personally as an athlete when I don't perform as well as my coaches (or I) think I can. As a coach I take it personally when I see athletes get frustrated or impatient or misunderstand movements or worst of all: hurt themselves--no matter how minor the bruise or scrape. I could honestly go on...and on...
While I know in hindsight that most of the things I took personally as a child and young adult were not the direct consequences of my actions or inactions, I have a very difficult time seeing that while in the moment. So in a quest to become a better wife, mother, artist, and CrossFit athlete and coach, I'm going to set a goal for myself this year that WILL push me outside of my comfort zone. I'm going to work really hard at not taking things personally. I believe that there will be immediate positive changes in every aspect of my life by unshouldering some of these burdens that were really never mine to bear.
I foresee that as a wife I can become a better friend to my husband because I won't take it personally when he comes home in a bad mood. He will feel more able to open up to me about the events that *ACTUALLY* pissed him off or hurt his feelings because he won't misread my interpretation of his behavior as *ME* being in a bad mood. Wow, that's even complicated to write...
I predict that I will be a better mother because rather than wonder where I've failed my son when he gets nervous and shies away from new people or activities I can focus on what he needs to hear or see in order to rise to the occasion. I will understand that others may be looking at me to set a parenting example (one way or another) for their own predicaments, not judging me and flinging me down the ladder of their private mental caste system.
I know for certain that I will be both a better wife and mother when I quit beating myself up about the amount of dog hair on the floor. Everyone is better off in a messy house as long as the kid is happy and the dog has enough mental and physical stimulation. Besides, I already know that I spend way more time cooking homemade clean meals than your average mom these days. At least we're all getting the proper nutrition to help fight off the virus lurking in the laundry pile!
My art will benefit because, well, Picasso and Escher and Dali (and whoever was the first to paint dogs playing poker--because you know there was no other reason for that outside of making the artist happy)!
CrossFit will make me a better athlete when I learn to recognize that my coaches really do just want me to get better when they shout those cues at me. They aren't being judgmental. Exposing my weaknesses should only arm me to defeat them, not defeat myself. I will become a better coach when I learn to read between the lines of the protests, or lack thereof, from athletes and understand that we are the same: we all take it too personally for our own good.
Lastly, I am confident that my faith will grow and I will develop a stronger relationship with God by not taking things too personally. God doesn't look down on me and say, "I think I'll see what someone else can do to make Vanessa feel bad today." I need to stop taking things so personally so I can give something to others around me who might need just that very something. Here's to 2014!
