The Confessions of a Multipod

So, 11/3/15, I found out I am a Multipod. Also known as a Scanner, a Polymath, a Renaissance person, or a MultiPotentialite. I had found this link to a TED Talk months ago and per my usual, I pulled it up on a tab to “look at later”. I wish I had watched it then and started on this journey even just a little bit earlier. I am 42 and all my life I have thought of myself as “broken”. Something must be very, very wrong with me. Other people seem to know what they want, seem to know what direction to take in life and seem to be able to actually follow it, and even enjoy it. I have no clue. “I don’t know.” became a mantra that drives my husband crazy, probably drove my family crazy (although I’m betting that it was a different version of “I don’t know” back then and I learned how to say that over the years). Because I don’t. I don’t have one singular interest that drives me. I don’t have one direction to follow. If I do get involved in something that interests me, eventually, I get bored and want to drop it. I keep switching to other things. I did a lot of those “What is your purpose in life?!” workshops, books, advice, therapy, etc. And continually found myself frustrated and disappointed (in myself). I have very low self-esteem, and am constantly bashing myself over something, anything, but especially this.

I had a constant, enduring image of a long, long hallway absolutely filled with doors on both sides and these doors kept constantly creaking open and letting all sorts of crazy stuff leak in, different ideas and interests, but then I had a stocky, stubby little dude running up and down the hallway desperately boarding up the doors as fast as he could hammer.  I was always wondering “Which door is the only one I can open, that will lead me to what I should do in life.”, watching my little dude, running back and forth, panting with effort.  Why can’t I just focus on one thing?!  Why am I such a horrible person, a terrible mate, a loser, a failure in life?!  Why am I so dumb (and fat and ugly too, but I think those are different matters) and untalented, or maybe a little talented but never a master?  The dreaded “Jack of All Trades, Master of None.”  I remember growing up with that idea and mourning it.  I’ll never be good at one thing.

It is an unfortunate argument that happens often in my relationship.  “Where are you going with this?!  Find a direction and do it!  Be happy!!!” and my lame murmur of “I don’t know.”  Which is unfair to my mate, but also myself.  Lots of blow outs about this.  So it was in the midst of one of these arguments that I found myself crafting one of my usual self-bashing, low self-esteem, somewhat groveling apology emails to my husband, stating how terrible of a mate I am and a useless, failure of a human being, that I decided to take a small break from the writing of this email (and I couldn’t see straight because I was crying).  I pulled up this TED Talk on my waiting tab and watched.  TED usually has been quite helpful in restoring my faith in humanity after ecology classes where my reactions to the information I was learning were often, “Oh my gods, humans are HORRIBLE!!!”  So, I watched Emilie Wapnick’s talk entitled “Why Some of Us Don’t Have One True Calling”.  Within minutes of her 12 minute talk, I’m sobbing uncontrollably, slobbering and snotting all over myself, my heart breaking, re-assembling excitedly afresh and breaking again.

https://www.ted.com/talks/emilie_wapnick_why_some_of_us_don_t_have_one_true_calling?language=en 

 She introduced a type of person that she calls “Multipotentialites”, people who, apparently by wiring, cannot choose due to intense interests in, well, just about everything.  These people might have felt, well, everything I have felt in my life.  Shamed by the culture that pushes towards “specializing” when we are basically “generalists”.  “What do you want to be when you grow up?”  I had a million answers for this question and I thought seriously about the agony of choosing.  How can you possibly choose when they all are so interesting!  But I learned, like most of us Scanners, to shut it down, try and seek a goal, a direction, and to realize that I must be existentially Broken.  To the point that 42 years later, I truly “Believe” it.  And here I was, watching this TED Talk and I was feeling utterly and truly Seen for very possibly the first time in my life.

(An aside here is once I got Astrology reading from the fabulous Caroline Casey, who told me, “You’re one of those people who can say ‘Oh, yes, I’m a therapist.’ and snicker behind their hand, meaning FOR NOW.  That you come from a long line of the type of people who want and can do, well, just about everything.”  (paraphrasing here, but I should go back and listen to her talk again, I might be able to see it with very fresh, new eyes).  Back then, I couldn’t assimilate that then, because, NOT OKAY to not have direction.  I guess I have done enough work and opening to be able to hear Emilie’s TED Talk in this absorbing fashion).

I felt cracked open.  I was howling and sobbing because I felt my heart breaking in terms of having lived in this horribly, incredibly stunted, narrow range of living for most of my life.  I was sobbing because I felt (finally) a REAL breaking of that old, solid belief “I am wrong.  I am broken.”, and sobbing because I could feel my broken open heart crashing back together in an amazing, fucking crazy new configuration.  Suddenly, I am Sourced.  I am Placed.  I could SEE myself INSTANTLY, I could even “Define” myself in a way I have never, ever been able to do, or even take in from others (I bet us Multipods very very often get compliments on our talents and skills, in a variety of ways, but maybe often feel threatened or depressed, when that is sometimes (or even often) followed by, “You should totally do that for a career, or pursue that in some way!!!” and then we push it away, shut it down.  I don’t WANT to choose, but I must.  And then I live in agony and brokenness and disappointment.)  It’s funny that most of my life I wanted the “Lightbulb” of inspiration, of Insight, the crashing down of “immediate change”, and had resigned myself to the slow (occasionally steady) slog of the “path of change” and here I am, being blown wide open.  Needless to say, I didn’t finish my email and instead ended with a “I AM an awesome mate and an awesome person!!!”

And then of course, like a good Multipod, I immediately dove in hard, buying Emilie’s book called “Renaissance Business”, and buying some books by Barbara Sher, who apparently has been writing about Scanners (her term) for a long time now.  HOW COME I AM JUST HEARING ABOUT THIS?!?!  And as I dive in and start learning about us (that there’s even an “us”, a whole community of Scanner Peeps out there!!!!  That I may actually have a real and true community that I actually BELONG to??!!!  I just can’t even……!!!!  My mouth is dry, my head is spinning and I’m crying again), that there are different kinds of Scanners out there, that we have hugely untapped potentials.  Not broken, actually normal, and even actually incredible and amazing people.  I tried to sign up for Emilie’s forum boards, called the PuttyTribe, but her once a month open sign up limited to 60 people filled so fast, I missed it by an hour.  So I figured I’d try again in December during the next open “house” and in the meantime, I’d start reading and exploring her website http://www.puttylike.com and reading Barbara Sher’s book “Refuse to Choose!” which I’m given to understand is sort of a “Bible” amongst Scanners.  So, I started there.

As I began reading “Refuse to Choose!” by Barbara Sher, I’m almost in tears again just reading the prologue.  Yes, this sounds very familiar.  When I get to “Elaine”, a description of a person at the very beginning of Chapter One, I’m looking around, wondering where the cameras are hidden because this description is basically, almost exactly point on, me.  I started reading about her first suggestion of keeping a “Scanner Daybook”, basically a Da Vinci Notebook, exploring ideas.  Any ideas, all ideas, flesh them out, write them out, play with the tangents that arise, go into detail or just write a basic idea and leave it!  Just GO.  WITHOUT any pressure that I have to follow up with ANY of them in ANY way.  The idea is to start, as she says, undoing all those messages that you can’t have all these interests and ideas and to start breaking down these old ways of thinking.  I understand it as the beginning of exploring, playing with and honoring the Multipod Self.  I’m buying my Daybook journal tomorrow after work.  And I’ll put in my first entry.  And I’ll continue reading and exploring.

Now, it’s not all Unicorn Farts and pretty Red Roses.  I told Marty, “I kinda have no idea what to do now.” and it’s funny because I’ve been saying that all my life, but now it felt different.  I don’t know what to do because I haven’t really synthesized and completely, fully integrated this new way of thinking.  I still have a lot of crap to undo from almost four decades of believing in an existential brokenness.  He said, “Yeah, you get this big understanding and then no marching orders.”  I have so many questions, although I think they basically boil down to, “What now?” and “What do I do with this?” and yes, even “How can I make money in this monetary world?”  I feel old parts try to surge, “You’ll never be successful, it doesn’t matter what you do.” and I find myself actually responding, “You don’t know anything, do you?” and feeling surprised.  Poor Internal Parts.  I get they were trying to protect me from disappointment, from perceived destruction.  But I think I’d rather pull a Steve Jobs here and put my efforts out, get shot down and just try again than continue in this contracted fashion of paralyzation (so many options and then I go with… nothing!)  Again, this is not a quick fix, I know that.  There’s a lot of fear in putting myself out there, being rejected, the fear of “well, maybe this isn’t real and none of it is true, and actually I do suck and nothing is going to work” still present within me.  And of course, I know I’m totally in the Honeymoon period.  It IS all Rainbows and Unicorn Farts right now.  But in a way, that’s alright.  In a way, I DO have my marching orders.  Start learning about “me”, start integrating, keep exploring, meet my peeps and community, and then, start unbarring and opening up all the different doors in the hallway and seeing what’s behind them.  And to be honest, I want to joyfully fling those doors open!!

So, those are the starting confessions of a newborn (or really, newly realized) Multipod.