There is no such thing as inspiration. Sure, there are memes and bill-boards, and influencers, and even professionals whose entire raison d'etre is inspiration but in the real world of getting shit done, inspiration is virtually worthless. The only things that matter are grit and enough inner desire to work hard and sacrifice. Inspiration is as transient as a fart in an elevator.
Why am I writing – yet again – about inspiration? It’s not the first time, unlikely to be the last; last night I was on a Zoom call with four men. Count them up, four humans with the XY sex chromosomes and one (me) with the XX chromosomes. We were talking about speakers/instructors for an upcoming event. There was a lot of talk about inspiration. Best thing you can do when someone starts talking about inspiration is simply let it wash over you like waves in the surf. Duck your head when the talk gets really turbulent, come back up into the green smooth conversation on the other side. People who believe in inspiration are generally kind hearted souls but don’t really understand that inspiration does not get you up at 4.30 am to carry a monstrous pack up into the mountains across sketchy terrain or send you out onto the dark ocean on a 70 kilometre crossing.
The men all thought that getting a female instructor would be great. A human with XX chromosomes to connect with the other XX chromosomes and inspire them to be better at the sport, to try harder, to do great things. I had my head down because, as I said above, the most sensible thing to do when the inspirators get going is to put your head down, don’t come up until the discussion has moved on to more concrete plans. At some point, I thought, maybe the men would ask the woman for her opinion. Of course, I have an opinion, I’ve written about my pink era, and my view, despite hearing the same arguments multiple times has not changed. Chromosomes in this matter are unimportant. Inspiration does not work.
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