The Best Fighter That Never Swam
This is the story of a woman named Pam. Pam was a unified welterweight boxing champion. 31 wins, no losses and 18 KOs. She trained extremely hard, had work ethic like no other, and was simply never satisfied. It is specifically this drive that made her the greatest pound for pound fighter of her time. Pam was also extremely competitive. She hated losing, and did everything in her power to prevent it from happening. One day during training, someone challenged Pam to a race outside on their 100m track. To the end and back, standard rules. Pam felt like she owned the gym, so there was no way this nobody could ever beat her. She was the best at everything. Then Pam lost the race.
She threw a fit of rage, then everyone out of the gym. Enraged at herself for being so subpar, she insulted herself continuously for losing. If she carried on like this, she would be nothing more than mediocre. Pam began training the following week. She trained hard, spent hours in the gym on strength and conditioning, running every single day to ensure she would never lose again. The Olympics were coming up, and once word got out that Pam had moved from boxing to athletics, she was scouted straight away. Pam thought there was no way she would ever lose.
The Olympics eventually came, and it was time for Pam to prove her worth. Her reputation, her career, her pride — Everything was on the line. She waited on the start line four hours before the race to be more mentally prepared than any other competitor at this event. She growled as she watched the other competitors enter, but it was clear that they were dampened by her aura. She told herself then that she couldn’t lose. She was the absolute best, and if that loser ever tried to race her again, she would knock him out of the park. Pam not only won this race, but recorded the fastest 200m time in women’s history. The next day, someone challenged Pam to a race in her backyard pool. Easy money, she thought. In her own backyard, in her own pool with her own water, there was no way she could lose. Then Pam lost the race…
Society teaches us that we should always strive to be the best at everything. If we don’t have the most money, fame, friends then we’re not good enough. If we don’t have a relationship, or we don’t match the relationship goals that we see all over social media, then we’re not doing it right. But the point of this story is that we can whittle ourselves away trying to master every craft that exists, to be the best swimmer, actor, rapper, human. But we simply cannot do it all. We are told we should live life on hard mode. Take cold showers. Eat 499 fruits a day. Exercise for fifteen hours. Read all of these very very important books. If we don’t we’ll be a loser, a loner, a wimp. We’re doing it all wrong, we’re incorrectly using our limited time on this earth and we simply need to do better. We are told that we shouldn’t be broke, so we spend our whole lives in the pursuit of money. But we are also told that money cannot buy happiness. So then what should we do if we want to be happy? I think Eleanor Roosevelt lays it out pretty smoothly:
“Do what you feel in your heart to be right- for you’ll be criticized anyway. You’ll be damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.”
We face so much invisible pressure from society and ourselves to always push as hard as we can to do it all in life and simultaneously be Like Mike, Like Kobe, like Steve Jobs. We need to have the ultimate work ethic, to be educated, woke, analytical. We must do what no one else can. But we don’t ever realise that these people are just people. MJ was a gambling addict, Jobs cheated Wozniak out of money and Kobe himself admitted working so hard had a negative impact on the relationships in his life. It’s undeniable that they are greats, but we take examples of these people and compare the amazing sides that we see to our own bad sides. It makes us perpetually critical of ourselves. It kills our self-esteem. We feel like we’re not good enough. So we beat ourselves up day in and day out trying to make something happen. But the truth is, it is DRAINING. We can’t continue romanticising the lives of others while simultaneously being our own biggest enemy.
We do have limited time, limited energy, limited mental health. But my question is why do we spend it trying to do everything that society dictates we should do, when we can invest it in what is important to us? These celebrities were great, but they weren’t perfect. Because life is not one uniform race. Having the best work ethic doesn’t make you the best significant other. Being the nicest person doesn’t make you the most helpful. Being a genius has no effect on the peace of mind which you have on a day to day basis. So we don’t need to have it all. We are at liberty to pick and choose what races we want to win. We can prioritise meaning over money, good food over nice clothes, buying pets instead of nice cars — Whatever you want mate, but we should NEVER try to win a race that we don’t want to run. All we do at that point is go against our fundamental nature, and it kills us.
If society dictated that everyone should climb mountains in their lives to symbolise their freedom and overcoming life, would you then start climbing mountains? Even if you thought it was stupid, and that climbing mountains does jack all for what kind of person you are? It is okay to be someone who never climbed that mountain, because if you climbed it, you would reach the summit only to say you have climbed a mountain. People may respect you more, it may make a good story, you might get attention from other people. But ultimately you will not respect yourself anymore for it, because deep down you know you had no true reason for doing it. You put your life in the hands of other people, rather than living for yourself.
I began reading quite often over lockdown. I’m into philosophy, so I bought all of these philosophy books that were meant to be so important. Prior to this, I had only read around a certain school of thought because I really liked what it was about. One of these new books was ‘The myth of Sisyphus and other essays’ by Albert Camus. It is a very highly regarded text so I decided to read it to become more educated, but I ran into some trouble. I would open the book, and it would take me 40 minutes to read 3 pages. And this book was small A5/A6 paper. But it wasn’t because I don’t know how to read. It is that the book was so unbelievably BORING. It was just pages of the guy relentlessly talking about the same things with fancy language, and the topic simply just did not interest me. But I forced myself to read it every day. Within a week, I had only gotten through about 20 pages or so. Eventually I stopped reading because I felt like it was a chore at this point, and it was. I was no longer reading for my own enjoyment, but just to match up to some social ideal of being intelligent and educated. I threw the book to the back of my drawer the other day, and picked up a different book that was way cooler. Now I can get through twice the amount of pages in one day than I could in a week before, because I read what I love and so I love to read.
My point in all this is to suggest that we don’t have to ruin our mental health and make ourselves hate the things we love just because society tells us so. It is absolutely imperative that we pursue the things we love with all of our heart. We tell ourselves it is not possible to do this, that we won’t survive and get by doing it. We’ll be casted out and no one will respect us. But if we live only to do things for reasons that other people dictate, then are we really living? Many of the things which make sense and are the right things to do were made up by people just like you and I. So why are they right and you’re wrong? Why should we feel guilty for being us? Why should we spend our time dying simply because we’re too afraid to live on our own terms?
WHO? WHO? NOBODY.
We have to learn to be kinder to ourselves. We can choose which races are important to us in life, and what type of person we want to be. It is our job to go out into the world and be that version of ourselves unreservedly and unapologetically. I will never be able to fathom how we can spend so much time doing things that we fundamentally do not agree with because we think it is the ‘right’ thing to do. According to who?! It is far more respectable to stand up for what you believe in fearlessly than to be great it everyone’s eyes but your own. It could very much end in everyone in the world hating you. But those who truly love you will appreciate you for pursuing what you believe in, even if they do not agree with it. Everyone else is none of your concern.
The pandemic has exacerbated problems we face already, worsening our anxiety and killing our motivation. Making us depressed. What we do not ever need in our lives is to beat our selves up on a daily for not being good enough. Because the only criteria that will ever be necessary to be good enough is to be who you are. To do what you love. Pam chose not to swim in that race, because she simply no longer wanted to compete at everything. She was tired and drained. And that’s okay. Because it’s okay to be the best fighter who never swam. She’s still the best fighter she can be, and that’s what matters to her. So take it easy on yourself for a bit, and invest your time and energy into whatever matters to you. Nothing else.
“if I am the longest relationship
of my life,
isn’t it time to
nurture intimacy
and love
with the person
I lie in bed with each night”
― Rupi Kaur
DISCLAIMER: Pls don’t break any laws though, yeah? I’d rather not have the Met knocking on my door charging me for inciting arson or some shit. Remember that everyone has the right to choose what they want to be, so don’t do anything that takes away another person’s ability to make that decision. Focus on you, chief.
A couple of different sources that inspired me to write about this topic. I would STRONGLY RECCOMEND you look at all of them — a small investment of time for a lot of insight. Separately, I think it’s massively important that we always take a step back and assess whether or not we’re in line with our internal compass.
