Are you a square peg?

by

Many thanks to Stephanie for sending this blog post my way.

 


It completely amazes me MizFit is four and a half years old.

(I look back on the blogging I did in 2001, too, and snicker at how rudimentary it all was—but that’s a different discussion for us old fogies post)

It seems like yesterday I sat on the couch with a now famous writer-friend, while the Tornado destroyed the play room, and announced:

Im starting a new blog. A fitness blog. A personal development blog. Im calling it Sisyphit!

Yep.

You read that correctly.

That was my plan.

You see to me, many days, the actions of getting fit & staying fit and leading a healthy life can all conspire to feel precisely like the myth of Sisyphus.

Thankfully my loving friend (& all other friends, family & veritable strangers I approached with the name) informed my while creative my new blog name sounded like a venereal disease.

So I pondered & I mulled and I tested and I settled on MizFit.

An attempt to convey what the blog is mainly about (fitness) *and* what the blog-writer really is (misfit).

Which rather circuitously leads me back to the Harvard Business Review blog post aptly titled What kind of misfit are you?

It’s a phenomenal post (Umair Haque being a far better writer than I) extolling the virtues of non-conformity.

Some of my favorite lines being (excluding the first sentence which I love since I seem to type it every other blog post):

 

It’s not that every misfit accomplishes something fundamentally unexpectedly awesome…But it’s also probable that most things unexpected, radical, and breathtakingly awesome take just a little bit of nonconformity; just a little bit of dissatisfaction with “the way things are.”

 

I stood and cheered while I read this post Haque’s post hit home the first time I read it and even more so today as this misfit prepares to head out (or am already out. or am already DONE depending on when you read this.) to Muffin Morning.

An event which is the launching pad for the Kindergarten experience complete with teacher-meeting, parent schmoozing, tattoo revealing, PTA sign-ups, Girl Scout opportunities—you get the idea.

A mandatory gathering where I find myself grateful to already know precisely the comfortable in my own skin, happily marching to the beat of my own drum misfit I am.

And thats my question for you today with many thanks to Haque for his post.

What kind of misfit are you?

An awkward gazelle in an a world of Solid Gold dancers?

A proud-tech nerd in this land of semi-Luddites (*raises hand at mention of the L-word*)?

A plain ole square-peg (who remembers fondly, as I do, when SJP was NOT a fashion icon)?

Please to hit us misfits up in the comments below.

 

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Comments

  4. I hadn’t seen his post and I definitely agree.

    In my business everyone who succeeds wildly has some sort of a rough edge or quirk.

    That is why I read your blog too, Carla

  5. I’ve been through 3 muffin mornings and can assure you knowing who you are and what misfit you are will make it all better 🙂

    HAVE FUN and report back.

  7. I’m a cupcake-eating fitness advocate, which I think has some folks rolling their eyes. But I gotta be me, right? I like to think of myself as a renegade more than a misfit. It sounds so…bad ass. 🙂

  8. I do not usually comment, but this drew me out.

    I agree with his point and still I find the term misfit to be negative.
    I like to refer to myself as raw around the edges.
    I like the mental image that conjures.

  10. Can’t help but think of Herbie the elf from the old Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer TV special. Remember his song? “Why am I such a misfit? I am not just a nitwit…” Remember Herbie? He wanted to be an elf and the head elf told him “You’ll never fit in! Now you come to elf practice, learn how to wiggle your ears, chuckle warmly, go hee-hee and ho-ho, and important stuff like that.”

    ANY time we do anything truly brave or important we’re being “misfits”… we’re stepping out of the mold society has made, and we’re morphing into square pegs of one sort or another. Maybe being a misfit isn’t a daily thing. Maybe we’re all misfits at some point or another in our lives, or in some domain. Or maybe we all just FEEL like misfits…. and that we all feel our human uniqueness as an individual.

    … some people more than others 😉

  14. I’ve always said the most fun and successful people I know are all a bit off.

    Here’s to being misfits.

  15. Great post!

    I do find that the more I learn to embrace my weirdness instead of apologizing for it, the happier I am.

    Now off to read the Haque post, sounds fascinating!

  17. Great post, as usual, Miz, and great blog article. I do think that misfits are correlated with awesomeness but I struggle with where I fit in the misfit spectrum. I consider myself to be a rule-following over-achiever, but I will question the rules, challenge authority, and try to change what I can–one reason I started my work blog. 😉

  19. I have to say that I am a Misfit in EVERY way in my life. I do things backwards and work from hardest to easiest and go the more complicated route in everything. I like being the stand out that is on the sidelines and then makes people think “Wow, I didn’t expect her to do/accomplish that.” I tend to be very competitive and this leads me to swim across the stream instead of down it.
    I love your posts and this one is no exception.
    Also, I am giggly in love with that skull icon up top. I may consider having it tattooed on me….

  21. The venereal disease blast had me rolling because when I read it I was physically shaking my head and saying, “oh that doesn’t sound good at all.”

    I’m a proud geek. Or as I like to say I let my File Extension Flag Fly. Wow, that was bad 😉

  22. I’m definitely a mama misfit: There are parts of being a mama that I love and fir right into the mold of suburban soccer mom and there are parts that I proudly bust out and I am totally my own type of mom. I’m proud to conform and I’m proud to not fit, all at the same time! Maybe I’ve got a split personality 🙂

  23. I love that you always remind us to be ourselves and do what’s right for us, even if that makes us misfits… 🙂 I know it sounds simple, and I should know this at this point in my life, but I think blogging can actually make it hard to do what’s right for you. We are all unique and different things work for each of us. Yet, it’s easy to be influence by those around us… It’s tricky as there are many good ideas… I think I am finally learning to stick to what I know works for me (fitness-wise, work-wise, family-wise, happiness-wise), even if that makes me a misfit. 🙂

    Have fun today! I still remember the teenager’s first day of Kindergarten like it was yesterday (and he is starting his second year of college next week!). It was such an exciting yet sad day! I don’t think any other milestone (middle school, high school, even dropping him off at the dorms last year) made me realize as much that he was growing up… Yet, it was also the beginning of a wonderful new time in our lives.

  25. I am aiming to be an eccentric misfit. It was my mum’s polite way of describing my…um…wierdness 🙂

    The beauty of being a scientist is we’re all pretty much off the beaten path, so individuality is encouraged. 🙂

  28. Your posts are always amazing! I always thought of myself as trying to fit in while still fighting the “typical expectations”. I know, does not make sense.

    BUT I am a weight lifting misfit – as I was doing this long before others wanted to or thought to – meaning a women doing it! I know you understand!

  29. Interesting and thought provoking post.

    Both of yours.
    I have spent much if not all of my life trying to blend in and fit in.

  31. My whole life I’ve been a square peg and (literally) almost killed myself trying to conform to some outward standard of perfection that I never could achieve. Funnily enough the more I’ve learned to just be honest about who I am and what’s important to me the more I find that I “fit in”. Not in the way my teenaged insecure self had once hoped but rather in finding a group of beautiful luminous friends who are proudly shining their multi-colored lights as well – like you, my dear!

  32. If everyone is a misfit, then no one is.
    Everyone is either a “runner, triathlete, yogi, fitness expert or minimalist exerciser person…!
    If you were a woman running marathons in the 70s and early 80s-you were considered a little strange. If you ran while pregnant back then you were considered “unhealthy” and it “wasn’t good for the baby”. If you did yoga back in the 70s-you were a hippie. If you started tris in the early 80s you are considered a pioneer of sorts I guess. That’s me.
    Call me “mom”, Cheryl, or Speech Pathologist…I will answer to those.
    The other “stuff” is just superfluous to who I am..

  33. If you ran a grand canyon double and pikes peak and tons of other mountain races and never told a soul any of the details or your experience, because it would cheapen the whole reason why……????

  34. If you ran a grand canyon double and pikes peak and tons of other mountain races and never told a soul any of the details or your experience, because it would cheapen the whole reason why……????

  36. It seems as though misfit would describe every particle of my being:

    I’m an engineer that hates math…

    I’m a left-brained, anal-retentive, control freak that can’t pick her dirty clothes up off the floor or maintain a clean car for longer than a day…

    I’m an “almost” masters carrying intelligent young woman that locks her keys in her car at least once a month, and forgets, even with the magic of Google Calendar, to pay rent on the 1st probably 3 times a year.

    I’m a nerd who sits in a cube for 8 hours a day, and relishes the 1 hour after work in which she gets to teach others about fitness and health and demand they do push-ups (and all sorts of other wonderful fitness torture devices).

    I’m a 27 year old female with a commitment problem, and fear of being a role model, that is head over heels in love with a man with 3 children, and subsuquently has fallen in love with said children.

    I’m a 27 year old female with a full calendar that could make even the most busy celebrity balk, that still makes time to co-lead a young women’s (high school) group once a week.

    I’m a person who hates being the center of attention, but listens to the calling to use the voice she was given to sing/lead Praise & Woship music every Sunday from 3-6:30pm, in front of 800-1200 people.

    I’m so completely against the grain with my quirky personality (engineers don’t normally have personality…) and loud and obnoxious habits that I’m surprised I have made it this far without being committed.

    And I like it that way!

  37. I think that if you could get deep enough inside a person’s brain, every single person on this beautiful earth is a misfit in one way or another. I was a misfit in my career for the past eight years – an ADHD teacher with a passion for questioning the system – and I think that it helped me grow and learn.

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