Mind Over Matter

  

A wise old owl from my high school, JG, wrote me something back in the day that included the phrase

You can't be all things to all people.

Mindy Gledhill, the singer-songwriter that my daughter prefers to fall asleep to, said  

You can never make art that everyone will love.

(the sound of me swallowing two bitter pills)

Not everyone likes me. There are some that embrace my full package, which includes a roller coaster and a chameleon and a silent thinker. Others tolerate me, ignoring my assets as well as my faults. No doubt there are a few that, deservedly, can hardly stand me. (Especially my classmates from 5th grade, the year I wouldn't share my Mr. Sketch markers because SOMEONE used the yellow marker on top of brown marker and tainted the tip.)

Not everyone wants me. I have tried to cross bridges to people only to end up stuck on a structure leading nowhere. I cannot worry about people that are not compatible with me. I am not for everyone. Some people do like the real me and I call them my real friends. My comfort lies within that small circle of safety.

There have been times when I have not been real*. Pretending was a huge waste of time. Can anything be built to stand on an invisible foundation? No. My masks and lies and cloaks of deception never helped me create anything of lasting worth.

I have made art for everyone. I am an open book free for the reading. Every now and again I break out in a prickly sweat from overexposure to the public. I'm afraid that people don't like the real me, the me that hates her knobby knees and worries about the loss of elasticity in her face but believes her insides are still what matter. The me that believes in a God that can reveal the good in all things, including horrible situations. The me simple enough to find happiness in things as mundane as absorbent dishtowels or a ladybug landing on my handlebars as well as the me that is complex enough to constantly struggle with feelings of forever falling short.

The universal need to be loved can create some real havoc inside my head a.k.a. The Roller Coaster Control Center. Whenever I find myself on the precariously dangerous I-Am-Not-For-Everyone Ledge I bring myself down to safety by remembering who I matter most to. Who knows and loves the real me better than anyone? My Heavenly Father. Remembering I am a child of a God is like a social anxiety reset button. If I am square with God I am good. If I can face Him I can live with my faux pas. He made me and I matter to Him. That is the most important thing I can keep in mind.

*A classic example of me being phony:

When I was single I had my eye on a gentleman at BYU that loved to run. I knew the surest way to get close to him was to be a runner. (As previously mentioned, not only can I not run, but if I attempt to run my kneecaps try to free themselves from my body.) I dressed up in running clothes and stretched on the sidewalk in front of his apartment day after day until he finally noticed me and asked me if I wanted to go for a late run with him. A run in the dark with a boy? Of course I'd love to. Because I was a runner.

I tagged along for his Tour de Nightmare, which meant we ran three laps around the entire campus. I don't know how I survived the first run but the next time I was his wingman I was smarter. As we approached the top of the stairs by the RB I told him he could keep running because I needed to run stairs for my current training program. He bought it and continued on while I descended and ascended until he was safely out of sight. Then I sat down for a good ten minutes. Once my eagle eye spotted him from afar I commenced pounding the stairs and acted like I was out of breath. He caught up to me and complimented me on my interval training.

Ten faux running dates later I realized if this boy somehow fell in love and wanted to marry me I would have to fake run the rest of my miserable life until my fake replacement kneecaps arrived in the mail. It wasn't the promising future I'd always envisioned for myself. I stopped wearing leggings and sneakers, stopped stretching in public, and married his roommate less than a year later.

Greg and I have never gone running in our almost 16 years of marriage.