I didn’t make a lot of parent friends when my kids were young. I’m not very good at making friends. That’s another topic for another time. But I think I overcorrected a little bit when my mom told me, “you know, Colleen, you don’t have to be friends with all your kids’ friends’ parents.”
The truth is, back then, when my kids were young, I found it exhausting to keep up with the Joneses. It seemed when my kids were young, conversations around parenting felt less supportive and more competitive to me. And I was just beginning to sow the seeds of this Bronze Medal Life and didn’t want to be influenced by judging myself or my kids against people whom I felt were “doing it better”. I think that keeping up with the Joneses is a trap that people fall into often by mistake. Like the frog in the boiling water, you don’t really notice it until it’s too late. In a lot of ways, I’ve been trying to avoid playing the game for most of my adult life.
Recently, a friend of mine went to her coworker for some encouragement. She’d been called into a meeting with someone in a position of power in her organization, and she said, “I feel like I’m being called into the Principal's office.” Without skipping a beat, her coworker immediately replied, “Feel like the Principal.” And it instantly became my favorite piece of advice.
Nine out of ten times when we stumble in life it's because we don’t feel or think that we are worthy of holding our own power in a situation. We think there is someone else in the world that is more worthy and that we need to do something or be something different in order to respect the hierarchy. We are embarrassed or ashamed of things that we have no business being embarrassed or ashamed about, because they are perfectly acceptable and normal. We think that other’s have been anointed by some magical property that makes them better or more important. Whether it is a title, an address, social capital, gender, or bank account balance. We get in our own way.
And it is all pretend. All of it.
I used to wonder if the “Joneses” knew they were the “Joneses.” Or if they were all trying to keep up with someone else, too. And that’s when I decided to stop. Because that is madness. The idea that anybody really has “it” (whatever “it” is), and everyone is running on this dumb hamster wheel trying to chase who-knows-what. That just doesn’t feel like a productive use of energy.
So, I decided to feel like the Joneses. Because in the words of Dave Matthews, “what I want is what I’ve not got, but what I need is all around me.” When you stop looking all around you for what someone else has that you perceive as better you’re telling your very own precious life that it’s not good enough. And that’s no way to be present and LIVE. Because you only get this one shot (and yes, I’m referencing some strange Mary Oliver/Eminem hybrid situation).
When I started referring to this concept of The Bronze Medal Life, it was very much in this spirit. If we start from the place of realizing that we will never be perfect. That we will never be the best. That we will never “win” (because it’s not a game. No seriously, it’s not). We can free ourselves of the grind of the pursuit. And instead we can grow into the comfortable space of knowing that we are enough and then actually start enjoying where we are.
And I don’t know about you, but I just don’t feel like we are on planet earth to be anyone but who were are. So, you ARE the principal. You ARE the Joneses. And whatever else you’re running after, just be it, and chill out. Because you’re doing great.
Love it!
Love this, friend. XO Excited to hang with you soon! XO