I'm sorry, I have been missing in action for a whole month. Much has been going on during this time. And hopefully I will soon get to tell you all about it.
One thing that has been interesting me during the last month is how my definition of myself has been changing.
Some of our definitions we use for ourselves are given to us by others or our society, some at birth. The first question of the new parent..is it a girl/boy? The first definition. Male/female. This is so important that friends and relatives send us cards proclaiming "It's A Girl!" Do they think we hadn't noticed?
Then more definitions arrive, daughter/son, tall/short, clever/what do we put here...well never mind, at least she's pretty. Or maybe she isn't. The labels arrive thick and fast, the fastest runner in the class, the one who can draw, the one who is last in everything. And our definitions of ourself are made up from these labels. They accumulate as life goes on, mother, fat woman, reliable friend....
So who are you? Who am I? And what happens when we choose to change the definition of ourselves? Before that day in March 2012 when I decided to run for 1 minute on the beach, my definition of myself went something like this.
Fat woman, always on a diet, dutiful daughter, wife, mother.
Apart from the fat bit, my definition of myself was framed in my relationship to others. I am a fat woman whose identity is as an adjunct to others. There is no place for who I am...other than fat of course.
Well, I have decided to redefine myself.
I am an athlete.
I was about to justify this statement, so say I have completed 3 races, a 5k road race, a 10k road race and a 10k trail race. I was going to tell you how many hours, or days I train, the distances I run...but this is not necessary. I am an athlete. This statement is enough. It stands alone. This is who I am and I do not have to justify it to anyone!
I am an athlete, who runs a successful home based business. Who is also a daughter, wife and mother. Who has successfully lost weight, that most difficult of challenges, and who will undoubtedly lose more. Who is happy. This is me.
Cool! I've been pondering it since I read it earlier today, and this is where I've currently got to...
ReplyDeleteI was an athlete once...in 1999 LOL. I would not, could not, call myself an athlete now.
Does that mean that I WAS an athlete then, or that I was BEING an athlete?
If you ARE an athlete, is that something that is valid now, or were you always an athlete & didn't know it?
And if/when like me you are no longer actually doing races & training, will you still BE an athlete? Are we 'allowed' to identify ourselves by what our minds identify with, even if we have to admit that our bodies have taken another track?
And does it matter? We just need to identify ourselves as ourselves, right, rather than as something defined in reference to something/someone else. Or maybe it's that we need to know ourselves rather than our role(s)...which brings me back to whether 'athlete' is a definition of self, or another role...
Thank you for your reply.
ReplyDeleteAn interesting question...is 'athlete' a definition of self, or another role....
For me it is a definition of self, yet it could be a role, particularly if it were imposed upon you by another. For example, consider the parent whose identity of self is manifest through their athlete child. The child may be an athlete, or the role of athlete may be imposed upon them, and often there is a blurring of the two. Or the spouse who only trains because their husband/wife trains, and who would much rather stay home.
In my case (and I suspect yours too) my desire to run (become an athlete) has come totally from me, and is therefore my definition of self.
As for our athletic past..we were in the 'is' then. In 1999 you certainly were an athlete. Since then you have been doing other things, yet your ability to be an athlete has not vanished...although it may feel like it 3 weeks into a new training program me!! It is simply a part of you that is not currently being expressed.
Consider a boy who does cross stitch as a hobby (this is a real life example) . He is a sewer, a craftsman, a 'cross-stitcher', he is talented at his chosen hobby. Yet as he grows into a teenager he realizes that his hobby is not 'manly' (and, oh, is this not grist for another blog post or two!) and choses not to do it anymore. We can no longer say 'he is a cross-stitcher', but he will retain that ability, although the skills may be rusty. Later, when through the teenage years our young man may marry and have a child. And he may take up his needles again to make a cross-stitch picture for his new baby. At this point he is, again, a 'cross-stitcher'.
Likewise, with you, you were an athlete, and just like the boy in the example, you can be again whenever you choose. With the benefits of knowing it has been done before, therefore it can be done again!
Have fun
Vanishing Woman