My Duality

According to the stories my mother told me about my infancy, I was a well-behaved baby who did not cry excessively and a deep sleeper who rarely made a fuss at night. When I was about three or four years old my father made the assessment that I cried too easily and far too often. I remember overhearing my parents discussing my behavior and my father warning my mother that she was creating a problem. In his opinion, she was treating me like a baby by allowing me remain soft and emotional and in doing so not preparing me for life which was going to be hard. When I started kindergarten my father did not go with me on my first day. He was sure I was going to be one of the kids who would cry and scream when their parents tried to leave. My mother took me to school by herself on that first day and years later I remember her telling the story of how proud she was of me when she nervously went to leave and I just calmly waved goodbye. I was transfixed by another child crying and screaming.

My father was a little hard on me about the crying and it did hurt me. It created an emotional dilemma for me. I wanted desperately for my father to love me and be proud of me. He was my absolute hero but my sensitivity and emotional moments disappointed him. So at a very young age I began to create an alternative personality to please him. I began to act in ways that would demonstrate physical toughness, a trait that I knew my father admired. I invented a physical little kid to play protector for my true sensitive self. I would engage in physically demanding activities to show that I was not fragile or weak. I would stoically face and quietly endure pain to demonstrate that I was not soft or afraid. My dad began to see that I was a tough little kid and he was so proud of me. My newly minted, hard-edged personality began to earn my father’s love and admiration. Even though there was still the occasional moments of tears, he so loved my hard exterior that he hardly seemed to notice when I would cry. Over time I began to build a reputation with team members, teachers, coaches, friends and enemies that I was a force not to be taken lightly. I actively built an alternative persona to protect the sensitive person I really was inside. I began to develop a duality of existence. I became the bodyguard of myself.

In high school I started to build a body that could equal my need to stand up to all who teased or challenged me. I started training for confrontation by lifting weights, running, and pounding on punching bags. I became strong and aggressive and my reputation as a fighter grew. All along in my heart I knew my hyper-masculine facade was a cover for my authentic sensitive self. It wasn’t long before I had created an image that caused others to fear me. By the time I was in my twenties my father had moved completely away from any thoughts of me being too sensitive or fragile and began to worry about my ability to be casually aggressive and violent.

When I was in my forties I began coaching soccer to little kids. I loved being their coach and protector. One day we had a game but we did not have a full compliment of players. It was a seven on seven league and we had only six boys. The other team had twelve players so they played seven at a time with plenty of substitutes. I tried to figure out a strategy for us to compete. After I outlined our wishful plan the boys took the field determined to do their best. As the game unfolded it became obvious that we were going to lose and lose badly. The boys were tired and beat up but they fought on too proud to quit. I stood on the sidelines watching them take the beating. After each goal was scored against us they stood and fought just as hard to try and stop the next. I wanted to go back to being ten years old and go out on the field and fight with them. I wanted to be a part of their incredible effort in the face of inevitable loss. But I could only stand by and watch, filled with pride, fighting back my tears.

The game ended and we had lost seven to one. The boys walked toward me beaten but far from defeated. They looked at me not knowing what to expect. I felt so humbled by their collective effort and I said to them, “Come with me to the middle of the field because I am going to cry and your parents have not earned the right to see me cry”. So we slowly walked to the middle of the field and they circled around me. I looked down at them, overcome by emotion and told them how proud I was of how they played. As the tears rolled down my face I said to them, “Of all the great moments I have experienced in soccer, of which there are many, this is by far the finest”. They did not seem surprised by my tears; my sensitivity did not diminish my standing; my vulnerability did not make them uncomfortable; they just looked at me and listened. Then the boy next to me reach up and put his hand on my shoulder and said in a quiet voice “It is going to be ok Coach Bill”.

In the middle of that field, surrounded by ten year old boys I let my sensitive self out into the light. My hard exterior melted away. I had come full circle. I had gone from being a small boy ridiculed for crying to the grown man comforted by a small boy as I cried. In that moment in time my need for duality was gone. We all just stood there…six small boys and me.