We Can Rewrite the Rules

Today, we're taking on Rhyming, Racing, and R@wdogging, but we're doing it in reverse because my-oh-my, what a reversal of fortune that word has had!

But why?

On R@wdogg!ng

Ours is a swearing house. The kids are going to learn it somewhere, I'd rather that was at home. The rule is, cursing is allowed, but you must do it correctly, in context, and do not be crass. Clever is allowed; crass is not.

Which is why when my then 14-year-old daughter casually mentioned “raw-dogging” something I dropped my spatula, spun around, and shouted “Don’t you ever let me hear that phrase come out of your mouth again?”

Her eyes got huge and tears started to well.
“I’m sorry, mom.”
“Do you even know what that means?”
A shaky “I guess not” made clear that she knew only that she’d crossed a line she didn’t know existed.

I explained the term – well, the old version, anyway.
She grabbed her phone and showed me the new version.
Young men on transatlantic flights with no phones, no music, no movies, no books.
The term had, apparently, morphed into spoiled kids doing boring things without distraction.

The evolution of that word troubles me. Originally, it connoted callously elevating one person’s pleasure or preference over the health and safety of another. An act which, without consent, constitutes assault. A hallmark of irresponsible behavior, for which women often paid the heaviest price.

And now, spoiled kids use it as shorthand for sacrificing comfort?
An click-bait challenge suggestive of stoicism?
It didn’t and still doesn’t sit well.

Since then, older folks seem to have reclaimed the term, swinging pendulum back, a bit, to prophylax. Now, it’s accepted as a comedic shorthand for doing something without proper planning or protections. Unironically, women still seem to be paying the heaviest price. (Looking at all my fellow late and undiagnosed ADHD women out there who have, unwittingly and unwillingly, been pushing through most of life without proper... well, most things, to be honest.).

It is, however, a fitting description of how I’ve approached a few too many things in my life.
So, let’s chat about making bad choices.

On Racing

Signing up for my one and only Spartan race was not the first time I’ve foregone proper planning or protection, nor would it be the last.

I planned to prepare; honestly, I did. But life got in the way and by the time race day rolled around, my revised strategy combined convincing myself that I was in “decent enough” shape with figuring that I could probably figure out the obstacles. The penalty for failing is burpees, and I can do burpees. Thus, the entirety of my obstacle clearing preparation included walking the course's accessible bits about two hours before my own race and observing other athletes.

One obstacle involved a heavy bag, anchored to a high pulley (apparently, it's called the Herc Hoist). The participant is required to pull the rope until the bag reaches a certain height. I watched a few ladies muscle it with their arms and watched this other lady brilliantly take a couple steps up on the barricade, reach high up on the rope, launch herself backwards, and let gravity do most of the work.

Smart.
I thought.
I can do that.
And I could.
And I did.

What I failed to do, however, was factor in physics. You see, I am not a small lady and she was. So when she launched herself backwards off that barricade, gravity gracefully balanced her body with the heavy bag. When I launched myself backwards off that barricade, gravity laughed.

Every bit of air and ego escaped me as I hit the dirt. When I did catch my breath, I pulled the bag the rest of the way to the bell, let it drop, dusted myself off, and finished the race.

On the drive home, I had what felt like the worst heartburn ever.

Three days later, hunched over my desk, I couldn’t take a breath deep enough to carry on a shallow conversation. I made my way to the company medical facilities and, when their equipment couldn’t diagnose the problem, the director chauffeured me to urgent care where we were quickly rerouted to the ER.

It seems that in my ill-advised launch I’d partially collapsed a lung.
I was sidelined. No running, no lifting, for at least six weeks.

On Rhyming

If you think that ill advised launch taught me a lesson, we clearly haven’t met.
Not long after, I decided that launching my body wasn’t enough, I needed to launch a business.
Writing and publishing rhyming children’s books, to be exact.

My business plan was roughly the same as my race plan:
I’m reasonably smart and hardworking, I’ll watch others and figure it out.

Ladies and gentlemen, that strategy is as awful as a business plan as it is a race plan and, just as the race collapsed a lung and sidelined me for six weeks, the publishing adventure collapsed my finances and sidelined me again.
However, if you'd like to buy some children's books, they're actually pretty cute and you can get them here.

On Redefining Words and Rewriting Rules

Because we’ve turned r@wdogg!ng into a joke, I could use it to laughingly describe my approach to both ill-advised adventures.

Honestly, though, I still can't bring myself to get on board with thinking that word is funny.
It’s tacky. It trivializes struggle and romanticizes risk in ways that are unsafe for the people who are not voluntarily choosing the risk for themselves.

I happen to be hard-wired for risk and I consider my willingness to fail big something of a superpower. Also, I think most great stories start with bad choices and I am nothing if not a sucker for a great story. (Ask me sometime about the sailboat we had that was captained by Captain Morgan because, we figured, someone on board should know what they're doing--just don't ask my sister or the Hawaiian Guard, because neither were nearly as amused as the rest of us).

But, with most of my ill-fated adventures, I don't jump in ill-prepared because I wanted to be ill-prepared.
I do it because I my only other choice is to stay on the sidelines. I want to experience new things, but often lacked the resources–time, training, money, or mentors–to properly prepare. Given the choice to sideline myself before trying or sideline myself because I tried, I'm inclined to choose the latter.

But I don’t love that choice, for me or for anyone else. While I'm fine with failing, recovery is costly--and whether its oxygen or money--there are certain things you simply cannot survive without. Given the choice, I’d choose support. Indeed, when I've had support, I've been pretty successful. But instead of creating a world that prioritizes proper planning and protections, we've decided to turn unsafe risk into punchline and have giving one of the crassest concepts out there a socially acceptable rewrite.

When I first settled on the Stack the Deck's tagline--Rewrite the Rules, Bet on Yourself, Win When it Matters--I was told “no one will book a talk telling people to rewrite the rules. It's not safe for corporate, corporate wants safe, corporate is where the money is.”
I know and, quite frankly, I don't care.
Corporate casually turned unsafe risk into a socially acceptable punchline.
Stack the Deck teaches the rest of us how to punch back by writing your own rules.

Rebecca Young | Speaker

rebecca@stackthedeck.net