the wall i keep headbutting
will i learn my lesson eventually? probably not.
I always find this time of year disorienting. As someone who enjoys hearing what other people think and wandering through YouTube, the end of year brings a sense of doom for me. The internet right now is full of end of year reviews, 'building systems not goals', 'gamifying your life' and my personal favourite, 'replace your phone with a notebook'. At first, this was cute. I could appreciate the sentiment of it, knowing full well that people are just using the same phrases to grab my attention, and sometimes it would work. But it also started to piss me off, because I realised time and time again that what works for the average person doesn't work for me. And that's a hard pill to swallow.
I want to be able to schedule time in my calendar to read all of the amazing pieces of content I've collected like a selfish magpie this year, but the second I put it in the calendar, I immediately do not want to do it. I also completely forget about my calendar the second I close the application, so there's no point. I can swipe away the notification that was telling me something important that I need to do today and poof, it's gone. I can create these amazing systems and stack my habits and put my phone in another room with it's own dedicated space so I forget that it's there, but then I forget to reply to my friends and family. I can carry a notebook around and you can call it a million different things (bullet journal, commonplace book, bunch of scribbles) but then I spend the whole time wondering whether I should have written that thing down or typed it out, the existentialism of knowing I am wasting paper and now I can't search for that information later and chances are I will lose that notebook before I can even finish it or I will get bored of the entire concept of writing down my thoughts and ideas despite knowing how good it is for me. When I say to people "oh, maybe I wasn't neurotypical this whole time," the most common response is "duh".
I can set every intention in the world, but it doesn't directly translate into laser focus in that direction, and I am slowly becoming okay with that. I've noticed more and more that life becomes a lot easier when you don't get angry at every minor inconvenience, even if that inconvenience is only inside your head. Who would have thought!? As it turns out, there is some benefit to living alone with the sound of your own thoughts, and I am getting better at not drowning them out. This last year has brought an abundance of time to find out what works for me, what doesn't, what brings me joy, what steals it away, what makes me anxious or frustrated or angry, and how to feel through those moments rather than avoid them. I was at a coach development workshop lately where we discussed a randomly selected reflection card, and for perhaps the first time in my life, I could answer the question "what are you doing to support your physical and mental wellbeing" with a genuine, thoughtful, tried and true response.
There is something to be said for learning how to go with your own flow, and letting go of the word "should". I'm far more kind to myself when things don't go how I'd hoped. I am more open to explore and enjoy challenging myself in diverse ways. I really love conversations, I didn't realise how much energy and thought and inspiration I get from thinking out loud with others, and I'm more intentional to design-in time to allow for this weekly, with different people in different settings to keep my mind wide open. It made me wonder how often we do this for others in our coaching/coach developing practices. Do we let people find their own flow? Do we create systems that help them thrive? Do we give them the space and love and support to find their own way? I would like to think so, but recently I've been challenged on this front.
What do you do when people don't want to learn?
I'm not sure this is the right way to ponder the question, so in writing it, I want to open it up for interrogation. I'm not convinced that people don't want to learn, but their behaviour in the contexts I work within can be interpreted this way. I try my best not to jump to this conclusion, that people are self-absorbed and close-minded and lazy and busy but they only say that to absolve themselves of responsibility... but those thoughts are below the surface, just itching to bubble up and be heard and get in the way. I've been leaning on the Iceberg lately to remind me that these surface level thoughts and the assumptions they often inspire are not the end of the interaction, that there is something deeper here, and it is not easy to remember this in the moment.
I think we take for granted how often we need to keep our biases and assumptions in check, because it's so much easier not to. In the same way that after a bad game, it is so tempting to take your frustration out on others and spray a team, even though internally they're probably already doing that. Or, if you've ever overheard me playing tennis with my friends, I let out an angry sigh when I hit yet another forehand over the baseline.
One of my favourite quotes at one of my favourite conferences recently reminded me that when we say to "meet the learner where they are at", this has to be in spaces that even I sometimes don't want to go. If a student just wants to pass the class, to do the 'bare minimum' and only wants to know what's in the exam, there is no prestige in thinking this is not a good enough goal. Who am I to determine that!? I feel this tension all of the time in my work now, where attendance at learning opportunities is embarrassing low, despite every intention to provide the kind of calendar that inspires every volunteer coach to do the best they can with the time that they have. There is a push and pull between a very clear need to raise the minimum standard of coaching so that young people don't quit sport (and physical activity) due to poor experiences at training, to raise a generation of people who do not answer the question of "what is your favourite moment being coached" with stunned silence, as memory reels play and no positive experience comes to mind. But most of the people I have interacted with in the last 18 months do not think that there is anything wrong.
It doesn't matter how many times we mention the statistics, they don't mean anything. A handful of kids not coming back next season (50%) means nothing to the coach who answers the question "how are you going this season?" with "we are undefeated"... in an U10s competition that has no competition points... so there is no championship to be undefeated in. I've heard of underground championship tables where parents and coaches track their own team's wins and losses despite the very intentional design of the competition to not have them, so there is no pressure to win or not lose - and yet people don't want to let go of this. WHY!?!? I find myself banging my head against that wall day in and day out, caught between the personal, wholehearted responsibility of making sure that no harm comes to a child while they are in my domain (and shit coaching is harmful, therefore something must be done), but the way to move the needle in this space is with time and care and autonomy - which means they also have the autonomy to do nothing. The right to disengage. To tell me to my face that I am not needed at a training visit designed to help them create a more fun and welcoming environment for young people despite the absence of joy and laughter and engagement that radiates from the training session I am standing at.
I know that I am more comfortable with chaos and uncertainty than most because the inside of my mind is a tornado of thoughts and feelings, but I would never expect anyone to operate at that level. I could only ever ask for one step in a direction of their choice, with all the support they could possibly need, and even that isn't enough to scratch the surface. So while personally, I have probably had one of my best years... professionally, I have more questions than answers. As always. But this time, it's not joyful - it's exasperating.
P.s. 22561 for those who are still counting.
P.p.s. this is the best end of year review from one of my favourite creators, thank you Struthless for being you and existing as you do 💗
FWIW — “you do you”!
You can’t drag the world along by the nose when it doesn’t want to follow, but you can shine a light, show a better way.
Be that fire starter!
Happy New Year
As you are, how you are is my favourite messy mind 💜