Kittens and Crabs

Life is about more than just figuring out what your thing is. That's important. You need to learn what you like, what you are suited for, that also adds value to the world. You need your dreams, goals, Vision. But once you have that, there are two ways to pursue it. And even before you have that very clear, there are two ways to pursue whatever it is you've decided to pursue, even if you're not sure it's the be-all end-all (which I'm not sure it ever is. Life is constant change except for one thing.)

You can pursue your dreams like a retracted hermit crab inside a soft, pink, cozy, terry-cloth shell. You are slowly inching towards your dreams and goals, but you are constantly seeking comfort, seeking to protect your tender parts from pain, from loss, from the feeling of being bad at something, or making a mistake, or being publicly embarrassed. In this configuration, life is all about comfort and avoiding discomfort. Generally associated with a fixed mindset. It's not actually very comfortable most of the time because if we ever stop to honestly ask ourselves how we're doing, there is the distinctly uncomfortable feeling of living well below our potential. Of squandering life. But then we snuggle in deeper to our soft terrycloth shell and watch some netflix or surf facebook and distract/numb ourselves to the unease.

The other way is like a wet kitten in the wind. Our beautiful hair is plastered against us, and our scrawniness is visible for the whole world to seek. We're shivering a bit, perhaps from the cold, perhaps from the fatigue we feel as we take wobbly step after wobbly step, often falling, always eventually standing up and continuing on. This is not the comfort mode. It's not possible to maintain long-term unless you are working from a growth mindset. Without the strength provided by that perspective, your energy is quickly depleted by self-judgment, anxiety, and the like. But with a mind that is kind to itself the journey soon becomes less shaky, less cold. And the previous feelings of discomfort that came when the softshell hermit crab are gone, replaced by a deep, rich, anchoring contentment that you are living a good life.

I suppose someone might say, "who wants to be a wet kitten?!" But the kitten is not always wet. Usually it is playing, warm and dry. It's just that the litmus test is: what happens when you get wet? Do you become the kitten or the hermit crab? Likely what you do when wet (when obstacles and challenges come, or you're doing something your not (yet!) good at) is what you do even when you're dry, for the most part. The hermit crab is slow moving even when dry, always with an eyestalk out looking for the next bit of water coming its way. Perhaps hermit mode is better for the few things that actually require great caution in life. But overwhelmingly, we go into hermit mode for things that are not truly life-threatening. Things for which hermit mode is not a helpful response.

If we look hard enough, we can all find at least some areas in our lives where we are adventurous kittens, rather than timid hermit-crabs. Find those things that you love to do, that you feel comfortable and confident doing, that you can play at, and not worry about whether you're doing "good" or "bad." Use them as templates for the other areas of your life. Apply those kitten skills and ways of thinking to your inappropriately-hermity areas so that you become more and more kitten-ish day by day.

For me, the kitten areas that stand out are improv dance and writing/creating. I think about how free and playful and unconcerned with failure I am in those areas, and try to take some of that into the rest of my life.

I'm trying to apply this especially to teaching and dating, two areas I have noticed I am very hermit-ish about, and that seem to require kitten-mode to do well. I'm working on it. Wish me luck.