I have a good story about my body –– and by that I mean one that works for me.
In the 90s I dabbled in some Alexander technique and my teacher Daniel Singer, whose now a senior faculty member of the ACAT, told me one morning that I had a “lucky body.” When I asked what he meant, he said, “Oh it’s like a top 99.9% body –– nothing goes wrong, it does whatever you want it to do.”
And the thing is, he’s right. No injuries, no illnesses, and although I definitely put in the hours, astonishingly flexible and strong thanks to all the yoga, but frankly also thanks to genetics. And even though when I’m in my most fighting trim shape (and frankly, it requires a national talk show appearance to get me to get it together to really tone up), although there’s always belly poundage I want to lose, I still have massive core strength underneath that unwanted layer. [IE, I’m lucky but also apparently a little lazy when it comes to working out.]
I do have other sets of stories though, ones that don’t work as well for me.
The trouble with these kind of things is that they are accurate and thus feel very “real” –– but sometimes they aren’t helping.
I cannot tell you the number of times people have told me that I’m ahead of my time –– the estimates range from a few years to a decade –– when I propose projects. “People aren’t ready for that yet” is something I always hear.
And I think back to myself in third grade, a particularly vivid memory of a day where we were looking up words in the dictionary. Each and every time I found the word before anyone else and while at first this was thrilling, it began to get a little old and then frustrating. “What’s wrong with these kids?” I thought. “It’s just understanding the alphabet.” But somehow I knew then and there that I was blessed/cursed with speed, and that a lot of my future might just involve waiting for other people to catch up.
There was a positive side to this one year later when our elementary school did a testing for weaknesses in basic English skills and I placed out of the program (ie, there wasn’t an area I needed to work on.) So for two afternoons a week, while everyone else tackled their “weakness” (punctuation, grammar), I got to enjoy free reading. I still remember some of the specific books I read during that time like CHITTY, CHITTY BANG BANG.
Part of this story is still really helping me, but part of it is also slowing me down. I like that I’m an originator, a “visionary” if you will, but I also feel that often on a pragmatic level I’m somehow behind. I often think “this is just a challenging time because once _____ happens, everything will sort itself out and then it will all go completely smoothly.”
[I once read a book about the psychological effects of the birth experiences — which I don’t believe in that much — although I will relate that as an induced first born I was crazy late and forced to appear in the world on July 2nd just so my mother’s obstetrician could make his July 4th holiday plans. Right from the start, I was thrust into the world without adequate preparation, perhaps leading to a life of brilliant improvisation.]
Basically, the paradox is that I’ve always wanted/needed a little more time to get ready and yet I always find the word in the dictionary first.
Anyway, here I am at the first Christmas, not fully aware how much the world needed to catch up with me, nor feeling the pinch of being just a little behind.
In this moment, my story is that everything is proceeding at the exact right timing, and I am LUCKY in EVERY WAY.
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