Today’s random dictionary point and post is brought to you by the word pin.
Pin: 1) a small thin pointed piece of esp. steel wire with a round or flattened head used for holding things in place, attaching one thing to another etc. 2) pin down — to a promise, arrangement etc. 3) force a person to declare his or her intentions 4) hold a person down by force.
The word pin certainly has a lot of different connotations, but there are several that will suit my purposes for a blog. The derivatives of the word all seem to revolve around the action of or the effect caused by a physical pin. It forces, holds and reinforces things. Much like society and our upbringing.
We are often pinned to stereotypes and dogmas at an early age. Depending on what kind of home, community or country you grew up in, you will have a very different perspective of the world and will have accumulated a variety of unspoken contracts unique to you that you’ve been unconsciously pinned to.
These are things we don’t even think about. Do you respect your elders? Do you hold the door open for someone else? Do you have an idea of what a boy or a girl should be when they grow up? Or what toys they should play with or how they should dress when they are young? Do you have access to higher education, good jobs, unlimited potential? Some of those will depend on socio-economic factors, other contracts like unlimited potential may have been reinforced by messages we received when we were young like, ‘You’re not smart enough,’ ‘You’re not good enough,’ You’re not pretty enough,’ ‘You’re not skinny enough,’ etc.
What you do with those contracts is up to you. At some point, you may decide the world hasn’t upheld it’s end of the bargain. Perhaps it’s let you down, mislead you and/or betrayed your trust. At some point, you may decide to rip up the contract(s).
The good news is, you can rip, toss and/or burn any of your contracts at any point in your life. There is no actual paper you signed with infant blood. You didn’t lay your hand upon your heart as a newborn baby and declare you would readily accept everything you were told and everything you saw.
You are free to make your own decisions, to weigh the pros and cons of every situation and experience and decide for yourself if things are favourable or not. And you get to walk away from past tendencies and old knee-jerk reactions at every opportunity.
Just because someone programmed us into thinking a certain way, doesn’t mean we can’t go in and figure out how to change the code. We are not pinned to anyone else’s ideas, judgments, expectations, biases or opinions. Release the latch on your life and make new contracts that resonate with you. Embrace who you were always meant to be.
In gratitude,
Marissa xo