Sideline Chick

Teddy said it best when he spoke of the timid souls that will never know victory or defeat. A reference to The Man in the Arena. We are quick to criticize when we see someone doing “that thing”, selling “that thing”, making that life move, dating that person, driving around with that bumper sticker, allowing their kids to do this that and the other, or not allowing them to. In reading that limited list (I say limited because there is an abundance of more things that judgements gets cast upon) you may be saying, yes yes yes – I have had stones thrown at me for all of those things! Or maybe you are the one saying, well of course I am critical of questionable decisions by people I care about, and it is because I care so much about them that I can’t stand to witness the embarrassment and messes to clean up that they will surely have in their future. No matter which camp we’re in, we are both a little wrong, and a little right, and what it boils down to is...the ego.

When we feel those pangs of judgement, what we are actually feeling is our very own ego. It is not the person tossing around opinions about our choices that is riling us, although we love to place that blame, it is our ego. Don’t like that, do you? Well there it is again, the beloved ego. So now that it’s a little mad at me for pointing at it, let’s keep pulling the thread.

What is ego anyway? A quick Google search reveals it to be defined as 'a person's sense of self-esteem or self-importance', with Webster driving the message home by defining ego as; 'self, especially as contrasted with another self or the world'. Self, especially as contrasted (let's call that what it really is, compared) with another self or the world. Interesting. There are an abundance of modern motivational quotes, books and affirmations aiming to discover and boost our sense of "self". In a bazaar way it seems we have come to need this in order to counter the inundation of the comparison culture we are gripped by, but the good intentions of all that inflating can be furthering the harm. To understand this, and the difference between ego and conviction, let me tell you about one of the dances with ego that I have taken over many years.

I was 19 when I went into the direct selling business. I was raised on Shaklee products and it just made sense to start selling them to fellow college students whose nutrition habits were sub par, like mine. Turns out, the bank accounts of my college buddies were also sub par, like mine. So I treated selling like a secret hobby. I kept my mouth shut not risking my ego being bruised by hearing 'no' when I extended an invitation to get on the good stuff, and just waiting for people to ask me instead. They didn't ask. I didn't tell. Ego intact. Fast forward a few years and I am doing all I can (so I think) to be a stay at home mom with enough income from selling Shaklee products to allow me to do so. I hobbled to say the least. Blaming the economy, my broke friends, my then husband for not helping with the kids so I could "work" because he was working the night shift as a cop and sleeping all day...everywhere I looked I could point at all the reasons that were not "me" for my lack of success. Cringing yet? Me too. And it gets worse before it gets better:

• "Secretly" ran up a credit card over $10,000 to keep up the appearance of success and contributing to the household expenses. The pride and ego were so thick that I was incapable of asking for help or admitting I wasn't pulling my weight - and worse, making that weight even heavier.

• Made snarky comments to people who told me 'no', thinking that my words might somehow be a motivation to change their mind, such as - "you can reach back out to me when you are ready to be well" - What? Who was I to say they weren't well in the first place?

Enough of that, right? I am still far from free of the constant whisperings of the ego, but I have discovered some truths. Conviction and kindness are game changers. Often times it takes hitting some pretty low lows to find said conviction.

The stability and financial freedom I had been chasing in direct sales for several years was just that, chasing. I was lacking the actual resolve and effort. But I found it on the sidelines observing others. I went to convention after convention, witnessing accomplished leaders in the wellness industry who were older than me and younger than me (in my mid 20s at the time), some who were living in remote areas of our country with minimal population to market to but still top earners, and those who most probably wouldn't describe as having the outgoing and attracting personality typically associated with high performance sales. But no matter what nook of our country or personal background they all came from, what all of the top of the top achievers had was firm belief which created a freedom from expectation. A true desire to better the lives of others, and our planet, and unwavering faith that what they were selling could do just that. They led with conviction and kindness, not passive aggressive persuasion. They were not deflated when someone wasn't interested in what they were pushing. They didn't take it personally or cast judgement if someone used a soap or took a vitamin that wasn't the one they were selling because they did not need their approval, praise, or money, to feel validated in what they believed in. It came from within and was unattached to the need to win everyone over. Conviction. Ego in-check. Game changer...but in a glaringly obvious ironic way, that realization was also my ego talking. If they could do it, so could I. But I had to harness my ego and direct it off the sidelines and into the arena to do so.

The sidelines are for watching. We can be inspired there. We can cheer on others there. We can keep ourselves protected from the exhausting efforts and risks of being hurt there. We can also get caught up in judgement on the sidelines - bad call ref, right? By being on the sidelines, how can we ever truly know what it is like to be in the arena? And how can we so be so justified in our judgements of those who are actually doing the thing, from such a place of inexperience? Because isn't it apparent that whether you're on the sidelines or in the scrum, there is a battle? A battle with the ego.

So I experienced success. Made decent income for minimal work, earned free trips, spoke to crowds of 1000's, earned recognition and more. Guess what all that did? Skyrocketed my ego. Because I had not yet done the work to soften that before helping others. It was self serving, and I crashed and burned.

It wasn't until I actually sat on the sidelines for a bit again, that I discovered how much I was in my own way - and that by being in my own way I was getting in the way of others too. During that decline, I went back to the blame game and citing all circumstances that weren't "me" for my diminishing success. Eventually I just went silent.

Up until recently, I thought silent was fine. No harm. Mind my own. But then it clicked. Withholding opportunities from others by not extending an invitation to explore better health and greater wealth WAS potentially harmful. My little resentment zone was not just limiting myself, the far more jarring fact was, it was limiting others and that was just the shift in thinking I needed.

The shift in mindset to the motivation to genuinely benefit others without any expectation of personal praise is not reserved to career paths. It is the path we all have the potential to walk in all areas of our life, the ultimate motivation of our purest human nature is to benefit others. Consider the effects of kindness on happiness. A 2018 study revealed kindness activities boost happiness, and that is not limited to kindness that receives praise or recognition, purely altruistic acts rank super high. And more recently the link to healing, particularly mental illnesses, through helping others has been documented by the Journal of Positive Psychology with uplifting and profound results.

We are here to get dirty, to experience, and to connect with each other. It is harder to do this scrutinizing from the sidelines. If you feel called to do the thing, DO IT! Worried about what others may think? You know what that is talking. Become convicted. And maybe the next time we find ourselves criticizing or tearing down others for that thing they may be doing, we take a look at ourselves to see if the ego is in the arena. Consider...why are we so caught up in what they are doing anyway? Does it actually effect the overall quality and trajectory of our lives? Does it even feel good to talk about them in a way that puts down what they are doing? Maybe for a minute, because we have temporarily elevated our importance over theirs...that is not real, and most certainly doesn't last. If you have genuine concern for the safety of a friend or family member based on their actions, act on that. There is most certainly a difference between danger and simple disagreeing. Let's do better. Let's cheer each other on. Let's have conviction. Let's lessen our need for everyone to agree with us. Let's just be kind. And most importantly, let's mind our minds.

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.” -Theodore Roosevelt, 1910