In Praise of Awkward Toddlers

As a child, if I couldn’t be assured that I’d do something right the first time, I didn’t even want to try at all. The result of this fearful stance was that I didn’t learn to swim (until I nearly drowned and my parents insisted) or to ride a bike (I’m still working on this).

What I’m talking about is the resistance we feel to being less-than-masterful at anything. We loathe performing awkwardly, even though this is a precursor to doing anything more gracefully.

Embracing our inner awkward toddler crucial if we’re to find our way to being well-fed. Like toddlers learning to walk, this is the two-step we must do: Toddle forward. Trip. Stand up. Toddle some more. Go splat on the floor. Get up. Toddle again.

Towards the end of 2013 I looked around my life and saw that everything was fine.

Fine.

Fine is good.

Fine is important if we’re to function in the world.

But fine is not enough.

Feeling fine isn’t the same as feeling alive or particularly satiated. Fine is just fine.

What I know: the only way through to what’s really good in life is to embrace being awkward for at least a time.

In the spirit of embracing more of this energy in my life I started attending Laurie Wagner’s brilliant Wild Writing classes again where we were instructed to write poorly, pen to paper, and then share it aloud with the group.

It’s awkward training at it’s best.

What you and I have in common is a hunger to feel alive. To feel more than fine. This I know.

As a little girl, my fear of being criticized trumped my hunger to feel alive, to have fun, to ride a bike, or to swim in the lake.

As a grown women, though, I’ve learned that external sources of criticism don’t matter much and that I can soften around my own.

As a grown women, I’ve learned that being awkward is just one exhilarating step toward being well-fed.