Alarm bells are ringing, but I am hiding away in the office, scared to go out and see what has happened to the house. I hear stomping, banging, and bone-chilling screams...
Of seven year old girls playing.
It is end of year break until the second week of January, which means they are full of energy and pretty bored of being at home with family after Christmas. There are only three of them today, but they are making enough noise for a marching band.
What is a bit interesting is that this is the first time these particular kids have been to the house, and their mother is here with them too. That in itself isn't interesting, but this is the second time the mother has been here, the first time was at the open house back at the start of 2020, before we bought it. They were really interested, but ultimately thought it was going to be far too much work for them to renovate. Fast-forward almost four years to the day, and she gets to see it again, fully renovated.
It is quite different now.
Walls have been removed, attics taken away and heated, every floor and wall surface changed, a bathroom added, a new kitchen, ceilings changed... The place is almost unrecognizable, with even the outside of the house having changed color, though with all the snow around and it being dark, it is hard to tell.
It must be a bit weird in some way to see the difference, or perhaps realize that if we could do it, they could have done it too. This isn't to say they have regrets or anything like that, but I think that often we question what we are capable of, until we are in the position that we have to perform. I don't know how many times in life I have backed out of doing something because I thought I can't or it was too hard, only to see someone else be able to do it and I have though,
I could have done that.
But I didn't.
Obviously there are lots of reasons we do this, but I do sometimes wonder what life might have been like if I had just tried at the things I wanted for, rather than choosing to optout out of fear of some kind. The fear of personal failure is one thing, but there are also other fears of loss of money, reputation, time, effort...
I do think that I would be better off for having tried, than not.
Yesterday with friends, we were talking about improv, as one of them has been doing it for years. I was saying how it seems that while there might not be a huge career in improv, it is where so many of the comedians and actors start. I think this is because it allows them a "safe space" to try and fail, because they aren't actually expected to get it right all the time, because there is no script. Ad-libbing is very difficult, let alone being able to also make people laugh along the way. Most likely, through the improve practice and performance, they get used to failure, but also in recovering and trying again in the next moment. They have people laugh at them both when they intend for them to laugh and when they don't, and they are okay.
I have never been like that. Never been a performer. Always been in the background. I don't know why really, but it has been a trend through the entirety of my life, even with the things I was relatively good at. I think part of this comes to being quite passive in going after what I want, combined with being quite uncompetitive in general.
I know some people who are super-competitive, but they compete for everything as if everything matters. They win a lot, but have very little of what they want. I also know people who are competitive only for the things that they are interested in, and they tend to do okay, because they channel their resources into "winning" what they want, not just winning.
Over the years and with limited, I have tried to improve my proactivity in chasing what I want instead if waiting for it to come to me. I think the thing that has made the biggest improvement change is reflection through writing, as it helps me better sort through what I want and what I don't, questioning more of the why, as well as bringing clarity to the how. It is a far better approach than I was taking, though I could do far better at applying what I know than I do.
What I have found is that a lot of life success is about overcoming our feelings of comfort, so we are willing to get uncomfortable enough to change. Being passive is "safe" because it means not having to make a decision, nor take responsibility for outcomes, but since we still have to live with the consequences, we may as well roll the dice. But, it is hard to overcome our comfortable habits, especially when the alarm bells go off when we try and say, this is not normal.
The kids are still running around screaming, which is nice, because I don't remember doing that when I was a kid much at all. Being a kid is like living the improv life, as it is a relatively safe place to try new things and to fail, without those conditioned alarm bells waiting to sound too soon. They have a lot to learn, and they can learn a lot more when they aren't getting in their own way.
I guess we all need to learn to get out of our own way.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
