I've recently gotten comments that puzzled me from two separate people worried
about my mental state. As far as I can guess, they derive from
href="http://dichroic.diaryland.com/underest.html">this recent entry. Maybe
some clarification is needed. While I take rowing seriously and one of the ways I
define myself is as a rower, my self-worth is not built on my speed in relation to
other people's. I'd be stupid to do that, given how much of rowing speed is a
function of body size. As I've mentioned before, I'm small; I couldn't find
anthropometric data online (I was curious) but I'm sure I'd be in the shortest 20%
or so for adult American women. Since rowing is a sport that rewards height, I'm
generally shorter than anyone else a boathouse around except for
coxswains.
Please DON't tell me it's not about other people but only
about pushing myself. That is one of the things daily rowing is about, true:
pushing yourself, that and just being out there with the moon and the water and
your boat. But racing is purely, simply laying yourself out against other people,
pitting your strength and skills and training against theirs. You can't even race
the clock in rowing, because wind and water conditions make each race different.
And I will never win a race, at least not in a single.
Erg tests are
somewhere in the middle: conditions are controlled and you know your own record,
so it can be about racing the clock and doing better than your own previous best.
But it's a bit hard to concentrate on that, even if that's what your own erg test
is meant to be, and that's all it counts for, when you're lined up with a row of
other people competing against each other to win a spot in a race boat. And as it
happens, there are no women lightweights in that particular program, and everyone
else's time this last trial was at least a minute faster than
mine.
BUT IT'S OKAY. Don't worry about me. I get annoyed at people
not respecting what I can do, sure, but I'm not about to tear myself down just
because it doesn't match what other people can do. They have different material to
work with, and in some cases rowing fast might be all they're good
at.
As I see it, there are three sets of things a human can be good
at, three that are worth building a self on - call them Head, Heart, and Body.
Head is brains and gumption and drive and logic; heart is pure goodness and all
about helping other people; body comprises athletics but also all sorts of
physical work, so it's not just short-lived triumphs. I think the supreme exemplar
of Body is not an athlete but
href=http://www.classicreader.com/read.php/sid.4/bookid.269/sec.11/">this
man.
I work on Body skills, of course, with rowing, and also on
some of the aspects of Head in which I have no natural gifts, like self-delusion
("ignore the pain") and self-discipline. And I've been working on Heart for
decades, trying to be a better listener and more healing to other people.
But all the things I'm naturally good at are Head and in those areas I'm
willing to take on all comers. If I ever am diagnosed with Alzheimer's or sustain
a brain injury, then you can worry about my self-esteem, but not now. The only
thing to worry about now may be the continued well-being of anyone who tells me I
can't do something I think I can.