Before I start this week, I’d love to let you know about an event I’m hosting for Kukua Foundation in Sydney on the 18th of September.
If you can come - yay! If you can share it with a Sydneysider - wohoo! If you know of anyone who’d like to donate to our silent auction or raffle - well then I might just marry you.
Details here: https://www.tinatower.com/kukua
Right now I’m on a quest to learn 50 new things before I turn 50. Want to offer to teach me something? I’d love that, because it’s always more fun to learn with someone else.
Recently I got the supreme joy of learning a new skill right alongside my 15-year-old.
The thing that my eldest and I just learned together was how to be ski instructors for beginners. I’m super delighted to say that we’re both now Level 1 Ski Instructors with APSI.
Not unexpectedly, she was significantly better at some parts of the course than me. Mostly the technical skiing parts. I shouldn’t be surprised. She learned to ski at four years of age and it’s been like watching her where she’s really meant to be ever since then. A fish to water, or more accurately, a penguin on ice.
When I was younger, I got all sorts of praise for being the youngest person in many rooms. Youngest ever Telstra Australian Young Business Woman of the Year, oh so young to co-own a real estate agency, wow, you’re young to have started your first business at 15.
People don’t say that so much anymore at 47.
Learning to be a ski instructor, I was the oldest person in the class, nearly older than the instructor. Some of the other twenty-somethings in the class actually said they loved having me there as I reminded them of their mum, who they missed while working on mountain, away from home for months at a time. This was both sweet and also a little like an out-of-body experience, as sometimes, like many of us I bet, I feel no older than twenty-something.
There were a few side benefits to learning this thing off my list.
My ski technique improved.
I also learned that knowing how to do something, especially when you’ve done it for a really long time, is very different to knowing how to teach something. I’m pretty delighted to say that if you, or your kid, didn’t know how to ski, I’d be able to get you up and running. Or downhill skiing, in this case.
And then there was the one-on-one time with my 15-year-old, and the immense sense of pride I felt watching her step outside her comfort zone, including volunteering to be the first to “teach” in our exam.
Legitimately the best shoe hack I've seen in the snow. I chatted with the Dad who mocked this up for his son and his reasoning was simple, we wanted to get to the snow and didn't want anything to hold us back. Love it.
Long story short, I absolutely believe that no learning is ever wasted.
Will I become a ski instructor? Maybe. One day. I’m pretty excited every time I’m on a mountain and to get paid for that? Could be a dream.
Regardless, am I better for the journey of becoming an accredited instructor? 100%.
Ben Lomond - in all its glory. If you haven’t visited the Little Mountain that Could in Tassie - add it to your list.
And ending this week, letting you know that I recently had an article published in Mamamia. My first actual gig as a paid writer. So a nice little milestone there. It’s pretty different to what I write about here, but I hope you’ll enjoy it nonetheless!
To read it, head on here: https://www.mamamia.com.au/calling-out-body-shaming/
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