The Joys of Doing Something Badly

So what would you like to try that’s new? What have you always wanted to do, but just never got around to it? What has that little voice been asking for that you’ve been ignoring up until this point?

What about writing poetry, or playing basketball, or dancing, or art. What about learning a new language or playing the violin?

Whatever it is, my recommendation is to do it—but don’t try to be good at it. Who has time for that? My advice is to get out there and do whatever it is – and do it badly!

Here’s a true story. A couple of years ago, a friend of mine came over to my house and saw that I had a guitar.

“Hey, can I play your guitar?” she asked.

“Sure. I didn’t know that you played.”

“Oh, yes. I’ve been playing badly for years.”

It probably took me about ten minutes to figure out what she had said. She’s played badly for years? What was she talking about? I knew all of the words that she had used in the sentence. But put together, the sentence just didn’t make any sense.

The problem is that we seldom do anything that we aren’t good at. We are taught from an early age that only those who are good at things actually get to play. We learn in school that only the best athletes actually play on the sports teams. The rest of us watch and cheer them on.

Only the best singers get to sing in the choir. The rest of us watch and enjoy the music. Only the smart kids go on the debate teams, take part in spelling bees, and take funky tests named after famous Mathematicians. And the rest of us… well we don’t watch, cheer or enjoy… (Being smart isn’t quite so glamorous!)

Eventually we learn that if we aren’t good at it then we don’t do it. So as life goes on and we get jobs, families, and other responsibilities, we find our free time quickly consumed with watching TV – continuing our pattern of watching other people do things!!

But is that any fun? What happened to the fun in life? When do we get to do things just for kicks? Why do we have to be good at things in order to do them?

We aren’t being graded anymore. Our team doesn’t have to win the championship! Us not being fantastic at something has absolutely no effect on anything or anyone at all. So what’s our problem?

When I first saw the motion picture “Mamma Mia”, I was shocked at who they picked for actors and actresses – not because of their acting abilities – but because they had to sing—a lot!! And most of the actors simply weren’t great singers. But sing they did!!

The funny thing is that now we own the movie and do you know which parts I love the most? The less-than-fantastic singing!! Pierce Brosnan belts out his songs with this Bruce-Springsteen-meets-Clint-Eastwood kind of voice. But he puts so much passion and heart into it, that his songs are some of my favourite parts of the show.

And the whole movie is like that. Is the choreography great? Not really. It’s kind of quirky and strange – but the dancers are having so much fun, that you just have to watch it over and over again. It’s so quirky and that we can relate to it.

Our society suffers from a serious fun deficiency. There is so much pressure to achieve and be the best that, in the end, only kids are allowed to have any fun. But we can change that. We can start doing things that we love without having the pressure of having to be good at them.

We can choose to play basketball with our kids even though we were the ones on the debate team. We can play the guitar because we like the way it sounds, not because we have dreams of sounding like Santana. We can take a painting class because we love the colours and the way the brush feels as it flows over the canvas without any plans of fame or recognition.

We can take some sage advice from Ms. Frizzle on the Magic School Bus. “Take chances, make mistakes, and get messy!!”

It’s time to have some fun!

(This column was first published in the Goderich Signal Star in March, 2009)