Whenever my friends are experiencing interpersonal conflict, someone starts yelling about Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps.
Since life is about conflict and connection, this means we yell about Michael Phelps a lot.
Maybe daily.
“I just feel really guilty about ( an extremely normal and human thing I did),” one of us will say.
“ What if (implausible nightmare scenario) happens to (someone I love) because of (my normal and well-intentioned action) ?”
Or:
“ Don’t you guys think if I don’t (perform an unasked for, highly specific form of self sacrifice) i’m being really selfish because of (a vivid and unfounded imagining of the other person’s childhood trauma?”
It doesn’t really matter what the situation is.
Almost always, the response to this question in the groupchat is:
STAY IN YOUR LANE, MICHAEL PHELPS.
Unpacking this response requires understanding our collective imagining of what Michael Phelps’ life, so. Here goes:
Michael Phelps, as you may know, is very good at swimming.
Michael Phelps, at least our imagined Michael Phelps, is a mental model, albeit one limited by our collective disinterest in sports.
But we know Fake Michael Phelps is committed to upholding the United States’ world record for swimming good, or whatever it is the Olympic swim team does.
Fake Michael Phelps has to direct all of the attention he can on swimming good. This is because, in spite of his supernatural athletic prowess, Michael Phelps is human.
Being one of the best swimmers in the world, even with his weirdly proportioned body*, requires an immense amount of concentration, and Michael Phelps has only a finite amount of energy on any given day.
Fake Michael Phelps doesn’t think about say, the massive amounts of displacement and environmental destruction caused by the Olympics, or the discrimination that black, trans, and disabled athletes face.
He also doesn’t care about whatever bullshit Ryan Lochte is doing in his sport, or whatever’s up with Simone Biles.
That’s not because he doesn’t care about those things, those people, the success of the rest of the United States Olympic Team, (though it is very possible Real Life Michael Phelps does not care about any of those things).
It’s because Michael Phelps has to swim his own fucking race.
The second Fake Michael Phelps takes his focus away from his race, even with his giant arms, he might lose.
Our Fake Michael Phelps, one that does not account for the immense complexities of fame, power, and politics outside of swimming, has a limited ability to affect the outcome of any race but his own.
If he wants to represent the United States, go real fast, etc, Fake Michael Phelps really only has one option:
He has to focus on his own damn race.
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So that’s why my friends shout about Michael Phelps at each other.
When someone in the group chat says “ swim your race Michael,” it’s usually very annoying. Even if you just said the exact same thing to someone else in the group chat about their struggle.
Almost always I am convinced my friends are wrong.
That actually, in my situation, I’m the freaking swim team coach — I have a responsibility to interfere, to help the people in other races move their arms different or like breathe underwater and all the other kind of things that make you go faster in swimming, I think.
But almost always, even if there is some weird excessive thing I could do to protect or save this person or martyr myself or singlehandedly end all injustice anywhere, it is way less effective than swimming my own race — handling my own issues, setting boundaries, being clear about what I want and how I feel (or at least admitting when I don’t know what I want or how I feel and taking time to figure that out).
Even when swimming my own race makes me feel scared, sad, out of control, insecure, or just anxious — it’s usually the best move.
You have to swim your race and other people have to swim theirs.
Bummer, right?
Originally published at https://notesonfeednet.substack.com on August 6, 2021.
