I know what your super power is......

Be honest now did you click this link because you are still searching for you superpower?

You know that one thing that you were MEANT to do? The reason you are on this very planet?

And you think I can tell you that – you must be bonkers, and yet in a way I may be able too…..

As you know I spend a lot of time reading self-help books and working on my own development and a lot of this has centred around my purpose on this planet. As a child of the 80s I am destined to believe I’m a rainbow unicorn bound for nothing but greatness in life. As a Christian I know I am special and loved and known and on this planet for a purpose.

The late and great Ken Robinson called it your “Element” you know the thing you are good at, where you lose yourself and time doesn’t matter and yada yada yada.

Tonight as I was in Church looking at the ribbons they have used to block of every other pew and realised I could have done it more efficiently with less staples but more ribbon and weighing up which would have been best I realised I’m really good at thinking of alternative solutions. Not problem solving, although I’m good at that too, but I’m really good at working through endless options and have no fear of trying new or different things. I can keep going for endless amounts of alternatives and the context doesn’t matter. In the last 5 years I’ve worked in in 3 different organisations and across about 6 different subject matters – within months I could see different ways of trying things. It’s part of my job right and yet I reckon I could do it with just about anything, feel free to test my by all means.

Wow did it feel nice – I was writing the blog in my head, “guys guys, finally at 39 I have discovered my super power”. In my head, whilst also praying of course, I was updating my CV, finally knowing how to search for the best job to suit this skills I have just badged as my most bestest.

I would have to say that feeling lasted perhaps 30-45 seconds because, well because that’s how God works, but because I realised how completely stupid it was. My superpower was solutions finder. Hahahaah.

I might be a great solution finder, I might be a great cook, an excellent mother, the worst person at hoovering. Who knows. I might be the very absolute complete and utter best at something that I never even get the chance to try. It’s possible right?

We are literally bombarded day and night with these extremes – worlds greatest, best, most handsome, fastest, richest, tallest …….and the negative is true too….poorest region, most deprived, least improved. It’s exhausting and only does us all a dramatic disservice in two very specific ways.

Who reading this spends too much time thinking does she have a better house, marriage, car, job even to the point that we might end up coveting things that in reality we don’t even want. I love how people look in patent DM’s to the point I’ve convinced myself I need to have a pair despite the fact I look awful wearing them and find them really heavy and have owned several pairs I never wore.

And all that time we could actually be thinking about what we do have and how freaking awesome it really is, and instead of thinking about whether or not we’ve found our element or purpose or calling how about I realise that my element, my super power is quite simply BEING ME.

So there you have it – your super power is simply being YOU.

You will definitely be good at some stuff, and shit at some stuff. You might even be really average at loads of things but the one thing at which you excel every single day right, even on the crumby bad days when you are drinking wine or eating chocolate in your pjs, kids are unwashed, clothes everywhere even on that day you are the absolute perfect version of your self. I’m not saying those people who are really good at one thing aren’t good at it – you know Rafa is after all pretty bloody good at tennis, but that’s just one part of who he is as a person.

In subscribing to the ideal that we each have one unique and special skill/talent or purpose we undervalue all those things that we do without thought or regard which make us incredible. We spend time yearning or searching for the job which ticks all the boxes, or the house/person/dress/book that “completes the picture” and yet every day we are both a complete and an incomplete picture. We waste time focussing not on what we have at our fingertips but was may be beyond our grasp, like Eve we want the apple because we believe it may give us something which is better than that which we already have. And so I am here to tell you I am tossing the apple back and focussing on the fact in my own way I am living in paradise.

We start thinking there might be some perfect best version of ourselves out there and then we look for validation of that and what do we find – an endless and exhausting way in which to compare ourselves to others so that we fall short. I’m not thin enough, fast enough, funny enough, patient enough .….another totally pointless and exhausting exercise.

Imagine spending all that time, every scroll, every tweet, every reality tv show thinking “crumbs that person is alright at cooking, so am I.” If you could just add that tiny sentiment to your thinking the outcome could be immense. Instead of feeling like you come up short you would be aware of all the amazing things you do achieve all the time without noticing or celebrating. Marie Kondo is really good at organising stuff, so am I. Rafa is really bloody good at tennis but I bet he can’t make my son smile so big it could lift my heart from the deepest of despairs.

So try it – I’m going too….and this doesn’t mean I’m not trying to be as good a version of myself as possible but it does mean I am going to make a conscious effort to shy away from best/worst/greatest language and move towards celebrating the spectacular and real version of my every day life and being.

The spectacularly ordinary is to me more super and powerful than any comparative nonsense I can think of tonight. My unique purpose and special power is to be as me as I can possibly be each and every breath and that’s something I can easily and happily work towards.

Sorry if you really thought I was going to tell you your superpower – here, quick, think of a number between 1 and 5….got it …..okay your super power is:

1. Greatest toast maker

2. Best shoe wearer

3. Most excellent colourer inner

4. Best friend ever

5. Perfect reader of blogs