Flashback Friday

So I just spent a little while this morning looking at Oregon colleges. I am not saying anything is going to happen but I just wanted to “see” what kinds of health and fitness related degrees were out there. Everything is baby steps for me and this was just a step to see what options might exist in this world. Obviously going thru college websites instantly threw me back to 1997 when I was a senior in high school researching college and deciding what the hell I wanted to do with my life. Obviously at the time I didn’t figure it out. I really didn’t. I am not sure if I officially thought that English or Business was going to be my major. Neither sounds appealing to me at the moment.

All of this college stuff got me thinking way too much about high school and the path I took and career choices. I was a very smart, studios girl. Probably not so much because I really enjoyed it, but because it was just what was expected or pre-determined for me. My father was smart. He had a Biology degree from Oregon State University. He was always a smart man. Caring about academics was just instilled in all of us at an early age. Plus the accolades and sense of worth from being good at something was a motivating factor early on. As a child there was no way I was going to excel at anything physical so academics had to be my thing by default.

When it came time to start thinking about college there was no doubt in my mind I was going it was just a matter of what the hell I wanted to do. I actually think it’s a stupid ridiculous concept that at 18, having only experienced high school I was supposed to know what would excite and fulfill me for my life. Obviously not. Obviously it has taken me the better part of 34 years to even begin to understand what motivates me and what my passions are.

Nonetheless, with scholarship after scholarship application filled out and college essays written I settled on Linfield College, a small private Oregon based school. I was excited. I was jumping back and forth between English, simply because I loved to write and at some point fancied myself a budding journalist. (That did not pan out) and then it was Business because that is pretty much a fall back on job that I could have done pretty successfully. Both are boring and safe. I am sure I’ve mentioned before my failed attempt at college. Fall of 1997 I headed off to college, moved into a dorm room and almost instantly realized I had made a grave mistake. It wasn’t my time. Things were not right. Nothing was going my way and as per typical of my personality I bailed. I couldn’t handle the pressure.

I was doomed from the get-go because my roommate was this ultra-thin and perfect volleyball player who already had a circle of athletic friends around her. When I arrived at college my freshman year I was awkward, and overweight. No real record but guessing I was weighing in around the 180-200 pound range. Exercise was the furthest thing from my mind. In fact I had spent the better portion of my entire life avoiding it at all costs.

This take me back to 6th grade where in middle school they offered band and choir as a choice INSTEAD of PE. Now I had no natural ability to play any instrument so band was out and if the choice was choir or PE, guess what I chose? Yup, I can’t sing at all. Like not a lick. It was awful and anytime we’d come to perhaps having a solo in class I’d panic and sweat would form but hell, it WASN’T P.E. and that is all that mattered. In hindsight I think I hated PE so much because it forced you to be pitted against all those kids who were naturally athletic and enjoyed it. If I had been given a safe environment to nurture the inner athlete who obviously lives inside of me perhaps my entire life would have taken a different path.

Back to college. My roommate and I had very different ideas of what the college experience were going to be like. Of course I didn’t give it much of a chance actually. We might have had more in common deep down than I thought, but again, hindsight. Then when I went to sign up for classes it was an awful mess and I ended up in awful completely unrelated classes and I just broke. I didn’t have any desire to take a politics class or ancient history and yet those were the classes I was stuck in. These are the things I blamed for me pulling out but the truth is, I just wasn’t ready. I was 18 and incredibly socially awkward and NOT ready. So after a week I left. Packed it all up and came back home. I did go to a community college and take undergraduate courses while I tried to figure out what the hell I wanted to do with my life.

I went for a year of undergraduate studies before finding the Visual Communications program where I spent another 2 years on graphic design, which I actually did love. I love making things pretty. Always have. That did fit right into everything that was up my alley. Of course though, I was still an awkward overweight girl. Bottom line is this, I was so afraid of how others perceived me I limited myself. I did not fully embrace any of it because I did not feel worthy. It took me a few more years from this point before I finally joined weight watchers for the very first time and put into motion a series of events that would forever change and shape my character.

In high school I was certainly known as the academic nerdy girl. I was editor of the high school newspaper, I was a pretty active kick ass member of the speech team and I took all the advanced classes. Did I mention DECA club, Key Club, National Honor’s Society, Leadership class. You get the point. There was not a soul that would have considered me athletic and rightfully so. I took my 1 year required PE the beginning of my freshman year where I spent more days than not dreading its entire existence. I was even known to skip a day or two if I knew something particularly awful was going to be occurring, like a long run. I shake my head now. Because even while I was dreading every moment of it, I’d on occasion wake up in cold sweats with vivid dreams of running free, literally running. My inner athlete was trying to break out even then. I shut her the fuck up, didn’t I?

I remember the athletic girls in high school. I was so jealous of them and their lives. Inevitably the athletic girls were the popular girls with all the friends. I believe I tried once to be the “stats” girl for an athletic team just to feel involved but you aren’t really involved if you are the stats girl are you? This is in part, why so much of my high school was so pathetically sad. I really didn’t have any true friends. I had a lot of acquaintances. I had a lot of people that I could talk to but no REAL friends. My sophomore year in high school my best friend got a boyfriend, whom she is very happily married to these days with 2 adorable children and she pretty much left me in the dust.

If you check out Facebook as a tools of keeping tabs on high school people I am certain no one would have every pegged their money on me being the athletic chick I am today. In fact I once had a popular jock guy from high school tell me on Facebook that he was blown away and would never have guessed. I still think about that. Who I was in high school was a derivative of circumstance. I did the best I could under the circumstances that were presented to me. Genetics were not kind to me. My self-esteem was shot and my ability to discover who I really was quite limited given the peer pressure of it all.

The thing is we all grow up and become what we were meant to become no matter what we once were. A lot of those athletic popular girls are exactly what you’d expect them to be these days. Nothing against them and no judgment but they became moms who struggle with their weight. And I became me. For the first time in my life I feel like this is the REAL me. All of my life struggles have led me to this place. I love waking up with a sore body from exercise. I love the thrill and anticipation of another good run. I love the mental clarity and satisfaction I get from being strong. All concepts that were completely elusive to me in high school. Concepts that would never had led me to a career path in health and wellness.

As I looked at course guides for health and wellness careers this morning I literally shook my head and nodded. Scrolling thru the list of topics, searching for the HE for health courses struck me as so ridiculously ironic. These were the very classes that I spent a lifetime avoiding and here I am, searching them out at the old age of 34. I’m not necessarily saying that I will end up back in college. It is all a little overwhelming and financially might be impossible, but it’s a step. A step to think about what might fulfill me. Perhaps I am sitting here in an office unfulfilled by my career because I’ve just been passing the time until I figured out my true calling? Perhaps the universe was simply waiting for me to get it right? All interesting thoughts.

We are never simply just one thing. We are all such complex human beings. Clearly at 18 I knew some things about myself. I do love to write. It has always been my outlet. As I sit here and write even know, my 18 year old self was fully aware of the importance of the written word in my life. Once upon a time, a 20 year old girl took a chance on graphic design and found something she truly loved which ignited the inner designer in me. That girl was not wrong either. I adore all things pretty and in its place. I am a designer. As much as I am an athlete, I am a designer.

I cannot regret any of the decisions I have made in my life because they are all my choices and have all shaped the woman I am today. I just have to believe in the power or rather our own ability to change. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that the 18 year old version of me would have bet a million bucks on the fact that the 34 year old me would NOT be where she’s at. And there’s something kind of refreshing in knowing that. Because basically it tells me that the possibilities are endless for what the 46 year old version of me could be like. I can’t even tell you because every experience shapes us.

Maybe, just maybe, one of these days I may just get it right. I mean, I have never been happier or more at peace in my entire life than I am when I am succeeding at my health and fitness goals. There are moments of true divine happiness when I am running. That has got to tell you something. That perhaps you should pay more attention to that little voice inside your head. You know that one who was giving me dreams about being an all-star runner back when I was an overweight self-conscious teenager. My inner voice knew all along didn’t she? I remember one day out of nowhere actually telling my mom, that I think I am supposed to run. I am not even joking. Can’t tell you if I was 16, 17, 18… but one night after having another dream I distinctly remember telling her and almost posing it as a question. The hesitation in my voice was apparent, but I said, “I think I am supposed to run. I think I can run?” Definitely a question. A question I ignored. And now I know I am supposed to run. I know I am a runner. Any doubt or question has been answered.

I guess the point is, it’s never too late to be what you were always supposed to be. Or to become the person you want to be. Either way, you are in control of your right now. And oh, by the way, secretly I’m totally looking forward to actually going to a high school reunion someday, say in 4 years, to a 20 year reunion and rocking it and being that woman who aged awesomely and is even better 20 years out than she ever was in high school. Now that would make my 18 year old self proud.