The Best Thing We Can Do for Our Partners…
Is be the best version of ourselves (and not do it for them)
I’m going to start this newsletter by telling you something that’s going to make me sound like a bad person. Hell, maybe that’s because I am a bad person, but regardless, I’m going to share this with you because it is the God’s honest truth: I fucking hate volunteering. I’ve done it before. I don’t like it. There is a very real possibility that I will never do it again. I promise to send money. Just please don’t make me waste my precious little spare time helping other people in some sort of organized way.
Now, to be clear, I have tried very hard to volunteer on previous occasions. I once went to the shelter to walk dogs. “I love dogs,” a naïve idiot in my skin declared. “What could possibly go wrong?” It made me so sad; I never went back. These days, I just adopt dogs instead. We have three. My husband has decided this is enough: “Even if we get a bigger backyard, Karli. No more dogs.” Fine.
I also tried singing Christmas carols in a nursing home. “I love singing,” a blissfully unaware dummy that looks like me said to herself. “What could possibly go wrong?” And then an old man whose family abandoned him during the holidays started crying, and it made me so sad… I never went back.
This was before I birthed a child and began bursting into tears at everything and nothing, but I can only imagine things are worse now. I doubt this newfound weakness does not translate well to serving in soup kitchens or delivering meals to elderly or firefighting or (probably) helping children purchase posters and picture books at the Scholastic Book Fair.
So, no, I don’t want to help at the bake sale. I’m not available to weed the community garden. I won’t be a good fit for the HOA board, and no, you cannot sway me with the promise of pizza. I will buy my own pizza, thank you very much.
And do you know why I have taken this hardline stance on something that pretty much everyone considers to be a good and decent thing to do? Because the absolute worst volunteer is the one who doesn’t want to be there, and I don’t. I’d be happy to write a check or send a gift. I’m perfectly content to buy back my time rather than spend it doing something joyless and devoid of fun.
Besides, I truly believe that the best way to help people is to do something we love. It’s not the same as volunteering, but my writing does that. I know because people who have no reason to lie have told me so many times. Whether you realize it or not, you help people by doing the things you’re really passionate about, too.
That might be coaching or teaching or reading people’s natal charts. It could be volunteering if you’re doing it happily out of love instead of begrudgingly out of obligation. Doing anything because you think you should in order to meet the criteria of a so-called “good person” never really helps anyone, and going through the motions definitely shouldn’t trick you into you’re actually being a good person. That’s just not how it works.
So, now that you all hate me, let me tell you what I am willing to do (other than throw money at things to alleviate any potential feelings before they turn into guilt). One of the things I absolutely love doing to give back is donating blood. My mom is a big blood donator, so I probably got this from her. I’m genuinely happy when I can do it.
At the end of last year, I made a commitment to donate regularly. Now, I make an appointment whenever I get the email telling me that I’m once again eligible after the 52-day waiting period between donations. The lift is so small. The rewards are so great. There are Oreos in the break room for God’s sake!
I usually stick to water, but I could eat a pack of cookies simply because I gave a bit of my A-plus blood to someone in need. They even give you swag or coupons to stuff sometimes. I now have two wonderful t-shirts that are small enough to be more than sleep shirts and a free personal pizza that I can redeem without having to chitchat with my neighbors at an HOA gathering. I love it so much.
Recently, an angel at We Are Blood, the place where I donate, bestowed upon me a miraculous gift. “Karli, has anyone ever talked to you about donating platelets?” she asked. Why, no. No one had ever talked to me about this before. I thought I was too scrawny to be able to do it, but apparently, I was thinking of plasma. You only have to be 110 pounds to donate platelets, compared to 115 for whole blood, which is what I usually do.
Blood Bank Angel proceeded to tell me about all the benefits, most of which I forgot, but one was definitely that it helped babies. I was onboard. “But I do have to tell you one thing…it takes about two hours,” the angel said, slightly crestfallen. “A lot of people read or watch a movie on their tablet or something,” she added quickly at the end, hoping she hadn’t somehow lost me at 120 minutes of uninterrupted free time with a book and no children in sight. “DELIGHTFUL. SIGN ME UP!” I probably yelled in her face. “CAN I START TODAY?”
I couldn’t start today. R. had just run to the grocery store with the Bean in tow. He was going to be back to pick me up right after my 40-min long donation. But I vowed to be back soon. The 52 days just passed. I scheduled my first two-hour baby-free reading retreat for Monday, and I could not be more excited to donate platelets. Let’s do this!
Now that you REALLY hate me, I’ll get to the point of why I’m revealing some of my least attractive traits (definitely not all—we don’t have a whole day to spend here, but I can assure you there are more). The reason is this: If we want to be truly amazing partners to the people we love, we need to be honest about who we really are, flaws and all. I’m not just talking about the sunshine-y version we show to everyone to keep from being ostracized for how awful we sometimes are. I’m talking about acknowledging everything—the good, the bad, the ugly, the fucking amazing, the extremely unpopular.
When we can be this honest with ourselves, we have a fighting chance of becoming the best version of who we are. We give ourselves this beautifully powerful gift of authenticity. And when we do this for our benefit alone, the resonance of owning our wholeness radiates outward. It ends up being a gift for our partners, too. They also benefit from being with someone who is living as the highest version of themselves. Often, they are inspired to do the same, which then gives us the gift of their best self in return.
That’s all a bit woo-woo, so let me return to my aversion to volunteering to give an example that’s somewhat grounded in reality. I don’t like volunteering for a number of reasons, but the biggest one is that doing it generally bums me out and makes me unhappy. If I ignored my feelings and did what I’m “supposed to do” to be a “good person,” I’d probably spend a lot of time miserable, spreading my misery all over R. and the Bean and the three adopted dogs.
Instead, I choose to honor my deep spiritual need for alone time. Sometimes, I do this by running off to a café to write or traveling to Tucson to do magic mushrooms with my girls, but other times, I take an opportunity to do something that makes me happy and feels like I’m making a difference in someone’s life while also giving me uninterrupted time to read without a tiny human banging on my office door and screaming MAMAMAMAMA through the space at the bottom. Taking those free moments and spending them how I like gives me the respite I need to be my most present, very best self when I’m at home with R. and the Bean and three needy pups.
You have the same choice. You can deny who you are and waste a lot of your life doing things that other people might approve of or you can give yourself permission to be the person you really are, the one who (like pretty much all of us) won’t be put up for sainthood after we’ve breathed our last. You can and should make these decisions by yourself, for yourself, but I encourage you to choose joy. You’ll be glad you did, and if they love you even a little, your partner will be, too.
With pleasure,
Yes, Misstrix