A note of context: I played ultimate competitively for a long time, and this newsletter began as an effort to examine life through the lens of the sport.
I played on the B team my freshman year of college, and I spent the entire following summer thinking about making the A team. The next year, my teammates and I failed to advance past Sectionals, so the season after that we were constantly talking about getting to Sunday at Regionals. Senior year, it was all about making Nationals.
After college, I wanted to make Truck Stop. Once I was on the team, I wanted more playing time and a place on the O line. Later on, the aspirations were trying out for the national team, a playoff win in Toronto, and a spot in the semis at Nationals.
There were always goals, and I was always chasing them. It’s like this for a lot of us: Make the team. Win the match-up. Get more playing time. Beat the rival. Go to Nationals.
This can all be a really great thing. A lot of the time, my drive to be a better ultimate player was about the joy you get from hard work, pushing past limits, learning to be resilient in the face of failure, and all that other good stuff everyone mentions when they talk about sports and personal development.
Other times, though, the fuel was something darker, buried much deeper down: the belief that I wasn’t good enough. Worshipping at the altar of always getting better was part of an effort to prove otherwise.
What I’m really talking about is shame
As far back as I can remember, I’ve carried a sense of shame—a baseline sense that at my core, something is wrong with me. It hasn’t always been conscious; in fact, I only really put a finger on it within the past year. But now that I see it, I know it’s always been there.
It comes in all shapes and sizes. It can be explicit, like judging myself as bad because of something I did or because so and so is better. More often, it’s a habit energy that runs in the background: a creeping sense that to achieve (and deserve) peace and happiness, I need to be something different than what I am right now.
There are also a number of names for it, like insecurity, low self esteem, or lacking confidence.
I’ll save diving into where it all comes from for another day. In short, there’s what’s been passed down from my parents and their parents and their parents; there’s religious indoctrination, where a bunch of adults kept telling me I was full of sin; there’s kids that bullied me in elementary school and doubts about fitting in after changing schools a bunch of times. The list goes on.
At the end of the day, it all funnels back to a bedrock feeling that I’m not quite right. That I should be better. That I have something to prove.
Frisbee to outrun shame; frisbee fueling shame
After it tells you that you’re insufficient, shame leaves you desperate to somehow disprove this claim. While it’s almost never been a deliberate choice, I’ve often operated with the logic that if I can just do this, that, or the other, I’ll feel good about myself and the life I live.
For me, sports have always been a place where this plays out. Even when I was a little kid, I thought being good at sports was something that made me good in life. Why wouldn’t I think this? After soccer games, my dad would take me to the toy store and give me a couple bucks for each goal I had scored. If I ran fast, made free throws, or turned double plays, adults praised me and other kids liked me.
I’m sure you can see where this is going as far as frisbee is concerned. When I found ultimate, I found a game and a community and a feeling that I absolutely loved. This is all true. What’s true at the same time is that frisbee was ripe with chances to achieve stuff and earn approval for it.
I rarely knew it at the time, but I spent a lot of my career using ultimate to try to outrun the demons.
Of course, this isn’t unique to frisbee. Maybe it’s a job, or being a musician, or playing a given role in a family. Who knows, maybe you even write a newsletter about emotions and part of you really hopes people praise you for it. Whatever you’re into, shame can turn it into a proving ground and measuring stick.
It’s an approach that might work out for a while. Going back to frisbee, most of the teams I played on were relatively successful, and I was always at least decent. There were stretches when I really felt affirmed.
They were fleeting, though. What happened when I lost a game, or got beat in that matchup, or had a bad practice? What happens when you drop a disc or get cut from a team? If being good at sports made me good, there was proof for only one logical conclusion: If I’m not good at sports, then I must not be good. I must be bad.
There’s something else I remember thinking when I was little: the boys who were better at sports were better than me. Not better than me at whatever game was at hand. Just better than me. More loveable, and more deserving.
To win a rigged game, stop playing
Today, shame is foundational to my world view. Looking at it more deeply has felt like finding a missing piece; it has helped me put a finger on some of the rotten feelings inside of me, and it has clarified the motives behind so much of the behavior I see in the world—my actions and others. I’ll say more about all that another time.
Right now, I just want to ask: how many of us are playing with something to prove? And if that’s the case… what do we really have to prove? What’s driving that?
What would happen if we turned off our constant reaching to be good enough? Even for a moment? Think about that for a second. Play with it. Suspend your doubt. What if we were all good enough, just as we are, and we had nothing to prove. What if we knew this?
Want to join a writing group?
A handful of people told me they want to know more about the writing groups that I mentioned last week.
Free writing has always been a huge element of my own self care; getting my thoughts out of my head and onto a piece of paper helps me feel so much more clarity in my day to day. I’ve also come to know that writing in community is a special kind of cathartic.
Soon, I’m going to offer spaces for people to free write, share, and repeat. Folks can write about whatever they please, and there won't be feedback from peers—just support and listening ears/open hearts. I promise it’s not as scary as it sounds.
I need to nail down a few more details. For now, if this sounds interesting to you, please fill out this form:
Speaking of writing, I’ve posted a few pieces that have bubbled up throughout this year on my personal website.
A few more notes
I love love love hearing from readers, whether it’s a quick hello or to share a few of your own reflections. If you feel like reaching out for whatever reason, please do!
I’ve got space for a small handful of folks in an upcoming (day time!) iteration of Men, Let’s Talk About Anger in Ultimate. Here’s the link if you want to be there.
I hear these emails are going to some people’s promotions inbox rather than their primary inbox. If you want it to go to primary, hover your mouse over my name in the top left of this email. A box will come up and there will be a little person icon to the right. Click that, and you should be good to go. Beyond making sure you don’t miss stuff from me, you’re doing me a favor because (I think, anyway) it lets Gmail know to send it to more people’s primary inbox.
If you do the frisbee Twitter thing and you like what’s going on with this newsletter, please consider sharing. With so many people tuned in, it feels like a good time to bring more people into the fold.
Enjoy the last games of Nationals
If you’re watching, I hope you’re having as good a time as Katharine and I have.
Much love,
Jonathan