Life, It’s Not Black and White
Over the past couple of years, I’ve developed an affinity I didn’t see coming.
Zebras.
Outside of Chris Rock’s character in Madagascar 1, 2, and 3, I hadn’t spent much time thinking about zebras.
The modern zebra lineage diverged from its common ancestors, the horse and donkey, 4 million years ago.
Today, their black and white stripes not only thermoregulate heat, but despite standing out, when running together, make it challenging for predators to focus on one of them, and make it confusing for biting flies. Zebras have great panoramic vision, and partner with wildebeests who have keen hearing. They are often seen migrating and standing together to combine their abilities to warn themselves of predators.
Evolution is an amazing process.
For much of my life, I was a horse, and not shockingly, some might say a donkey.
There are many innate characteristics, which are the foundation of my existence. But more recently, I’ve looked at my evolution as a process that enables me to be more in line with the person who wants to feel more grounded, purposeful, and safer in my own skin.
It’s a process:
Recognize that you want to evolve.
Put forth the intent, and start.
Stick with it, recognize, and give yourself the grace that it won’t happen immediately or consistently.
Understand that it is an adaptation for you, and for those around you. Sometimes that’s a good thing, and sometimes that’s challenging.
Have the vision to recognize the incremental gains as the wonderful evolutionary process they are.
Now, while we don’t have 4 million years, we can make material changes to our wellness. You can transform based on tactics and repositioning.
I distinctly remember my friend's father and my coach in the middle of my rec-league soccer practice calling me “space cadet.” My ADD diagnosis at 17 felt like a get out of jail free card for being a space cadet and a perpetually awful student.
Today, as a parent and coach, I can recognize how frustrating and rude that must have felt for him. As an adult, I know some of the challenges I’ve faced throughout my life, and my attempt at evolving was more of a fight that often left me flailing in my own personal riptide.
I spent the next thirty-plus years feeling like that was something I needed to shed, that it couldn’t serve me well. I fought being me, didn’t swim sideways out of the riptide, and wrongly fought hard to be a donkey. (No offense to donkeys.)
Whether it’s our communication style, patience, work ethic, relationships, or just being more comfortable in our own skin, we all have areas we’d like to adapt and become, or even more so, the regulated, content, and joyful versions of ourselves we know we want to be.
My evolution is recognizing that being a space cadet allows me to sense and process information in a way that makes me, me. It enables me to comfortably evolve, contrast norms, and see that just because things may appear black and white, that couldn’t be further from the truth.
5-Day Journaling Exercise: Your Evolution, It’s Not Black and White