I worked all week on a blog post about perfectionism, polished it up at my brand new writing group this morning, then sat back and realized it was the biggest piece of privileged white lady bullshit ever written.
I do see the irony in the fact that I trashed it. But truly, it was tone-deaf and inane, and while I do think I am capable of tackling that topic successfully, I certainly didn’t do it with the self-congratulating drivel I hurled onto my screen this week.
So I came home from my writing group and resumed childcare duties. My kids asked me to play “fancy restaurant” with them (read: covering things from the pantry in maple syrup), but I told them to amuse themselves for a bit, as I needed the hour in between lunch and our impending playdate to finish up my work.
And they told me, not in so many words, fat chance, lady.
For reasons I’m sure my therapist and I will explore this week, having my creative work curtailed by domestic responsibilities burns me like the white-hot fire of a thousand suns. The more questions I tried to field about My Little Pony and/or possible miniature bobcat sightings, the more my computer screen seemed to be melting my face into my eye sockets, Raiders-style.
WHAT I’M LOOKING FOR IN A CONVERSATION IS NOT AN IMPRESSIVE RESUME. IT’S A MUTUAL ACKNOWLEDGEMENT THAT HEY, IT IS REALLY HARD BEING A HUMAN.
The hour ended with me tearfully pressed against the back of my bedroom door, wondering if I was the first person to fail at all aspects of her life simultaneously.
Now they’re in bed. It’s about twelve hours past my usual post time. But it’s still Friday, and I think posting on this side of midnight will keep me from locking myself in the attic, so I’m sifting through the original post again.
Here’s the only part of it I like:
“As I heard Valerie Chaney say recently, what I’m looking for in a conversation is not an impressive resume. It’s a mutual acknowledgement that hey, it is really hard being a human. It’s a curiosity about whether it’s hard for me in the same ways that it’s hard for you.”
I stand by those three sentences. And in that spirit, I’m giving you what I took away from a big, juicy blog failure today.
- I am not on the other side of anything. Among the most dangerous ideas we’re hocking in the self-improvement world is that if you put in certain work or follow a certain teacher or complete a certain program, your mistakes will all be behind you. We want personal growth to be a straight, upward line, but it’s always going to look more like a spiral scrawled by an agitated toddler. Sure, I’m doing my anti-racist work, but that hardly means I’m done writing or speaking things that are steeped in privilege. I haven’t reached the other side of that work because there is no other side. All we can do is keep walking further from where we’ve been, and to pause for a second before we hit Publish.
- I can still have compassion for myself. The reason I wrote privileged white lady garbage today is because I am a privileged white lady, and I have compassion for myself as I search for ways to show up in the world that are helpful, not hurtful. I also have compassion for my default parent self, and for the signals I’m still sending to my kids that it’s okay to interrupt Mom until she rains hellfire upon the entire household.
- The worst stuff is the best stuff. Failures and embarrassments and disappointments are the Disney FastPass of life. I can cram thirty seven peaceful meditation sessions’ worth of spiritual growth into a single anxiety attack. Today pointed right to my sore spots, and that gave me a chance to put a little Neosporin on them. Without the bad stuff, all you see is your glossy coat, and then you’ll never know how mangy you really are.
I made it under midnight, and although I don’t really know how to get in our attic anyway, I feel slightly safer from my inner madwoman. Thanks for witnessing again. I hope your week is peaceful and free of conflict and crises of identity. If it isn’t, however, you’re in good company, and I’ll leave Mark Wahlberg Talks to Animals right here in case you need it.
