Keeping Ourselves In Good Company

Do you know how to juggle? It’s good for more than just juggling.

Go find three objects of similar shapes and sizes.

Start with one object. Hold your hands in front of you bent at the elbow. Toss the object from one hand to the other with an arc that’s about as high as the top of your head. Do this several times with both hands until it feels comfortable.

Add a second object so you’re holding one in each hand. Throw the first object just like earlier and now throw the second object before catching the first. Throw, throw; catch, catch. Do this several times until it feels comfortable.

Bring in a third object and hold two in one hand and one in the other.

The tosses will be just like when you had two.

Now you throw the third object before you catch the second.

Start by just doing three throws and three catches. Throw, throw, catch; throw, catch, catch.

Do that. Reset. Do it again.

Work your way up to continuously throwing and catching.

If I was to harbor a guess, you just read through the instructions and didn’t try. That’s cool, and you’re missing out on more than juggling by not trying.

Juggling can be a simple means to learn and examine how you talk to yourself. This is extra apparent if you don’t know how to juggle already.

How does your self-talk start? How does it change over time? If someone walks by and sees you learning does that impact your self-talk? When you believe they are there do you suddenly talk out loud? If so, why?

It’s likely the case that the more brutal your self-talk gets the more mistakes you’re making while juggling. Before COVID-19 shut the world down I was at a seminar that used juggling to uncover self-talk. They encouraged everyone to subvocalize, “yes” to themselves every time they threw a ball. That couldn’t hurt to try and it’s a hell of a lot better than saying things to yourself that you would never say to a child or dear friend.

We’re all hanging out with ourselves a lot more than normal right now. It’s crucial that we are able to keep ourselves in good company. Juggling isn’t that different than forgetting about the laundry, spilling something, stubbing your toe, or spending an hour on social media that you intended for something else; we aimed at one thing and something else happened.

“I’m so bad at this,” is very different from, “Good, I still have a lot to learn.” “I can’t believe I did that,” is very different from, “I wonder why that happened. What could I do differently?”

A friend of mine imagines that they have themself as a child with them at all times. They gesture to their child-self and superimpose them into reality. They know that they would never say anything to themself today that they would not be willing to say to themself as a child.

Another frame I like is to treat yourself as if you’re someone whom you are responsible for helping.

In both it’s important to treat yourself well, with kindness and with patience.

That’s something we could all do with a lot more of right now.

If you want to take this to the next level and you’re sheltered in place with someone else, invite them to learn to partner juggle with you. Emily and I have started doing this after we discovered that we’re both decent basic jugglers. We’re making up patterns as we go; the current one we’re working on is having us both juggle three balls and we pass each fourth throw.

Regardless of how you go about it, partner juggling is another opportunity to get a view into the stories you tell yourself. In truth, observing one’s own stories is always available.

When I juggle with Emily I am never harsh with her. If there’s any frustration or cursing I am aiming it at myself for “making a mistake that I shouldn’t have made.” Shouldn’t according to who? When I’m making a long string of mis-throws or dropped catches I start to feel bad or guilty that “I am holding her back/I’m holding us both back.”

I’ve done a lot of work to be kinder to myself, to be able to notice my stories, and to find ways to interrupt them. And these moments of self-flagellation are still there. Fortunately, I know to relate to them with patience and compassion.

“I’m holding us back.” Catch the story. Have a moment of self-compassion. “I know you’re afraid that people will leave and you’ll be alone if you make too many mistakes. This is your bae and she’s proven time and again that she’s not going anywhere. Take a breath, look into her eyes, smile, reset, try again, and celebrate no matter what happens. This moment is a gift.”

There are many silver linings to COVID-19. In no way am I making light of the situation. Seeing those silver linings is a choice and, sometimes, as simple as observing what’s always been there in the physical world and in our internal one.