Do you know any trampoline tricks?
I know plenty—front flips, basketball dunks. Unfortunately, I never learned to backflip. I still sort of regret it.
It’s not exactly a trick, but my favorite trampoline hack is to put a sprinkler under the trampoline on a hot day. It’s the perfect summer activity—much better than any slip n’ slide.
I’ve clocked hours on the trampoline, mostly before the age of 14. My family owned one for a short period before it was violently attacked by a shoe. Afterward, the neighbors bought another which became the gathering place for years to come.
We exhausted that trampoline. Cousins, and their cousins, and friends, and strangers jumped as one—actually, that was one of the tricks. We called it a “launch.” It was terrifying when you were the smallest, involuntarily being hurled toward the sky by a single, synchronized jump. It was elating when you were the biggest.
In life, I was used to being the youngest. I was the youngest child not just in my household, but on both of my parents’ sides of the family. I didn’t know what it was like to have the fun squashed by a crying younger sibling. On the trampoline, though, my world was widened.
During one concentrated bout of trampoline basketball, we received a terrible message from one player’s younger brother: “Mom says you have to let me play.” Eyes rolled, and we let him up, but it wasn’t long before he inevitably got hurt.
In one instant, our game came to a quiet as the boy slipped off his feet and landed facedown. What happened next was like witnessing an alien abduction. While the youngest laid facedown, his friends and brothers began wiggling like Jello, flailing around in a Charlie Brown dance. I was confounded. Had the neighbors become possessed?
What I didn’t know as I watched them wriggle was that I was witnessing an expert older-brother move: The “shake it off.” The older boys were instinctively demonstrating a response to the younger: You’re not hurt. Shake it off. The beginning of tears evaporated as a smile broke through. The boy let out a few shakes, and our game resumed.
The thing about this trampoline, where many such scuffles occurred, is that it actually works against falling. It’s expressed purpose is to bounce you back. When you do fall, it even stretches to soften the landing. Of course, extreme injuries can occur. But there’s generally a big difference between falling on the trampoline and falling off it.
Earlier this summer, I heard a statistic that struck me oddly. According to Pew Research, 42% of all adults go through a major faith transition. Whether it’s from Presbyterian to Pentecostal, Christian to Atheist, or vice versa, that’s nearly one in every two people changing their faith tradition.
What surprised me about this figure is that it’s so regular—so common. 42% is a lot of people.
It almost doesn’t match the image in my head. When I think of what it means to change faiths, I imagine the tortured few—those fighting deep angst and inner turmoil. I picture online personalities and their in-depth personal accounts. (We call them crises of faith for a reason, don’t we?) What I don’t picture are one in two of all adults.
It’s almost a little humorous; half of the people you spoke to today have experienced some sort of existential event relative to their faith—or they will. Did you talk about that at the watercooler today?
The thing about these events is that they feel deeply personal—hence the dark image in our heads. But they’re actually extremely predictable—hence the 42% figure.
It feels personal, but it’s predictable.
This concept applies to much more than changing faiths. Jobs that end, relationships that don’t pan out—so much of what we call life strikes us so because we’re the ones living it. We’re the characters in our play.
If we’re really honest, though, how many Broadway tickets are we selling?
There’s an axiom in writing (likely originating from Psychologist Carl R. Rogers): “What is most personal is most universal.” That is, the more you write about that experience you think you’re alone in, the more that others relate to it. Audiences see themselves in your most intimate moments.
Again, a little hilarious: That experience you think is unique? Literally millions of people have been there.
The truth about life is that not much of what we experience, whether good or bad, is all that remarkable. At least, it’s not rare. There’s little denying this mismatch between our personal experiences and their impersonal perceptions, but there are a variety of ways to handle it.
I’ve written about one of my pet peeves, trying to logic the life out of living. Emotions are irrational so don’t feel them. Hobbies are inefficient so don’t indulge them. Life’s not all about “what you want,” so don’t do anything that you want. It’s true that we must learn self-discipline, but this particular school overcorrects in this direction.
This way of viewing the world, I think, is one major response to dealing with pain. If life is so common, why get yourself invested? The solution is to be less human.
The other extreme is equally unhelpful, though. I’m a human and I feel it all. You don’t know my trauma. Don’t minimize my pain. Again, there’s valid truth. We are humans, and we bear scars of our mistakes. Worse, many feel the stinging of other’s actions—wounds inflicted on them through no fault of their own.
But again, there’s such a thing as overcorrection. Not every pain should stop you in your tracks. There’s a difference between falling on the trampoline and falling off it.
No kid wants to be the crybaby on the trampoline. In the moments when you fall, as you’re deciding how to respond, you may be justified to stay down. It does hurt. But once your brothers get one good laugh out of you, it deflates the point in crying. There’s more fun to be had by simply shaking it off.
The same is true of life. To be human is to fall and ache; yet this is incomplete. To be human is also to get up and experience the next thing. It’s the good and the bad.
The bad hurts. It feels personal, but it’s predictable. More than you realize, others have lived through the same. For me, this deflates any point of despair.
Pain is a part of life, but so is bouncing back. The next time you’re with a couple friends, you might as well ask them, “Been through any faith transitions lately?”
Carl Rogers?! Great reference.