played overcooked yesterday with the fam and i was definitely the weakest link, but i’m starting to embrace stuff like that more now. even started playing a first-person, get-motion-sickness-after-20-minutes game with ernest. and this time around he has been very patient… unlike with mario! 😤
i was raised to be obedient and the definition of obedience included also just being good at everything. math. piano. ALL subjects in school.
so if i am not good at something it feels really bad. i literally feel shame and embarrassment. so much so that i just stop doing it. if i’m not immediately good at it i can come up with a million excuses as to why i don’t want to do it but mostly i’m just scared of others seeing me not doing it well. i see it as my own personal flaw, it’s cause i’m too stupid, slow, or dumb — my brain doesn’t work properly for me to be able to perform this task. if it’s a group activity, i’m going to let people down or hold back the group. but more recently, i think this type of pressure has been lifted from us in society in general (at least how i see gen alpha being raised). seems like there was more of an emphasis on immediate perfection when i was growing up. kids getting praised for magically just being good at something, having natural talent. what about the rest of us? i’m not advocating for just giving out As for effort, but somewhere in between seems like a good place to help motivate people do the hard things.
i think after i learned that it takes at least 10,000+ for anyone to be an expert at anything, that made me feel better. have i put my 10k hours into coding or guitar, no. then why do i expect to be good at it? and the studies about the brain being very malleable and things like how sleep is so important to imprinting learning have helped me reshape my approach to learning/doing things, rethinking my unrealistic expectations of being insta-good at everything.
but beyond those stats and studies (which could be true or not… i understand it’s complicated), i have had two personal experiences where this has proven to be true for me.
- reading war and peace 10 pages at a time
- sucking at ski lessons and then being a super star (in the loosest sense) the next day
i was reading another book one day and realized how easy it was coming to me. i was enjoying reading like i had as a child again. i used to be a major bookworm and somehow had lost it. it just took putting in the practice and time to be able to return back to it.
and it was super rewarding to come upon this realization. that my brain can get unstuck if i just keep at something, consistently enough. without the unreal expectations adults were putting on me, so many new paths have opened and learning how to do something is so much more fun and less ridden with anxiety. the anxiousness is still there but i’m better at stepping past it now. i have all the time and space i need now to do whatever i want to do. no need to be good at anything, right off the bat. keke
embracing that i’m probably the least experienced writer in my memoir class right now, i probably get the most out of it. hoping one day i can give better advice and feedback to other writers. just have to keep on writing. consistently i guess. which has been quite a struggle… hoping this blog will help fix that.