One of my favourite social media quizzes is the ‘What Animal Am I?’ quiz. Not because I enjoy social media quizzes but because it puzzles me how there are literally a zillion different animal types, but you always get a ‘standard’ creature like a sloth, horse, or tiger. Why are the results never a sea slug or a flea?
Whilst I would love to say that I am a magnificent racehorse, I don’t need a quiz to tell me that I am more of a Greyhound. Greyhounds can run fast. Really fast. In fact, they’re the fastest dog on the planet and one of the fastest mammals, on the condition that they have something to chase.
However, just like me, the proportion of their lives in which they choose to exercise is small compared to what is arguably their favourite activity: snoozing. This is why they’re often described as 60km couch potatoes.
I am incredibly lazy without something to focus on, pursue, catch, and conquer. However, I would like to consider it conserving energy for the next chase. Considering this, I like to ensure that I always have a focus. Every day has a plan. Behind each plan, there is, you guessed it, a plan. Add to that plan timeframes to give me an extra push, and wha-la – I have my bait. What is more, I will exhaust myself to catch it.
If you are one of those people with a plan for everything, I salute you. After all, what good do you get out of doing nothing or wandering aimlessly every day? Now don’t get me wrong, I definitely have times planned for me to ignore all the things. However, that comes with a time to start doing all the things.
On the other hand, my husband could be likened to the roaming Asian elephant, which, when starting a journey of over 500km, has no idea when it will reach its destination. Whereas I have a clear vision when I wake up of what my day should look like by the time we go to bed, I am confident he has no goal outside of breakfast. What comes next? He will worry about it when it happens.
Highly productive in our own ways, it has been interesting to watch over the last 23 years of our marriage as I push against my 60km couch potato grain, and he embraces the roaming elephant mindset. Needless to say, our marriage has had some very colourful arguments.
The real question is, why do we (traditionally the woman) have this need to be what we are not? Why can’t I simply be the 60km couch potato I am born to be? As we all know, the obvious answer to that question is, who would do everything?
I have spent many days, hours and minutes working on methods to herd my loveable roaming elephant so he will join me in chasing the bait. Note: Elephants don’t chase bait.
Over time I realised that it was I who needed to adapt. Just as a professional ice skater needs to constantly train both by themselves and with their partner, this greyhound also needs to focus on her own skills – like how to focus and be a 60km couch potato – conserving energy for when it is needed most.
Just as an elephant loves peanuts, my husband appreciates life’s smaller, constant things. The less complicated and deadline driven, the better. So I set about making a weekly plan that will give us both a focus whilst remaining simple and non-specific. I used themes for the day as opposed to tasks and deadlines.
It was a far cry from my extensive time slotting gotta catch that bait approach, but it was effective. He has been able to roam around finding his theme peanuts for the day whilst I over-plan to my heart’s content to reach my vision of the theme.
So to all my fellow Greyhounds and similar species, do not be dismayed when coupled with a larger, presumably slower and possibly more intelligent creature. Remember that small peanuts catch big elephants.