Last night I was watching the latest episode of a show I’m into with my wife. She really isn’t all that into the show, but agreed to watch it in order to make me happy. In this show about super hero type characters, one of the characters seems to be beat over and over again by other characters stronger than him. See he doesn’t have super powers of any kind and he always had the excuse that the people beating him did. It seemed like as this show went on the character increasingly was angered by the fact that he keeps losing and seems to be reaching a breaking point.
Its with this set up that a scene plays out where a couple of characters who don’t have any special powers but are highly skilled and trained enter the story. Like so many others they beat this character who cant seem to win. When this happened I said out loud to my wife “oh, he is really going to snap now”. She asked why, why is the character going to snap now. I paused for a second and said “well he cant even beat these characters who don’t even have any powers”. That was not actually truthful to what I was thinking. While it is true I thought he was going to snap because he lost to characters with out powers, what I didn’t say was that he lost to characters who didn’t have powers and on top of that they are women.
So upon reflecting back on why I wasn’t truthful, I must have known that I was being sexist. In my brain the expectation was that the man should be able to beat the woman in a fight. However thinking about it logically, the individual with the better skills and better training should be capable of winning a fight regardless of gender. My brain snapped to an expectation of results of a physical contest based purely on gender and that is sexist.
Last week I started a section where I try to be appreciative of criticism I receive. At some point in this past week, my wife commented that I am too in my own head, that I am not aware of my own surrounding because of it. I think that is true and I appreciate her saying that to me. I think I often am too in my own head, and it was through this criticism that a something in my mindfulness exercises finally cliqued for me. Its to be present in the moment. To appreciate what is in front of you and experience the here and now, instead of having my mind wander into the future or get stuck in the past.
See you next week