My name is Jaime, and I'm Canadian. I’m in
the process of getting my Greencard. As a function of the immigration process,
I haven’t been allowed to work since March. I haven’t been allowed to go ‘home’
to Toronto since then either. I'm kind of an in-between legal alien. At 31
years old, I'm finding it exceptionally difficult not to have a vocation; not
to have something to be proud of, professionally speaking. Not to have a 9-to-5
to call my own when someone asks, “And what do you do?” It’s hard to say,
“Well, I used to be the Editor-in-Chief of Canada’s biggest bodybuilding
magazine… but now I'm a happy housewife.”
Recently, however, I had a paradigm shift. Or
rather, my wife shifted my paradigm. Since we moved to Florida, I’ve taken on
the responsibility of coaching and programming at Crossfit ABF – our home
Crossfit box in Clearwater; 5 days a week I coach, and I plan out the week’s
worth of workouts for all the members. On top of that, the gym recently moved
locations, which meant building a new gym from scratch … In only 3 weeks. I
helped the owner tirelessly for days as we got the place ready.
I was also
doing all the domestic things around the house: Cooking, laundry, cleaning,
fixing, buying. Whatever needed to be done in our little apartment I did. I
made our food for the week, packed her lunches the night before, and made sure
there was dinner on the table when she got home from work. And lastly, I was
our social events coordinator; any plans that had to be made, any time we
wanted to go out, or see what our friends were doing, I set up the date night.
I arranged our calendar, and planned weekend trips, staycations, day trips, and
nights out.
 |
| In my country, I have a Bachelor degree with Honors in Kinesiology. But "This is America." |
When I told Katie that I felt like I lost my
purpose when I lost my job, she said, "Are you forgetting that you took on
the job of coaching for free? And that you're building an entire gym from
scratch? And the fact that we have more friends now than ever?! Baby girl, I
don't know how you do all of it in a day." And boom! Just like that, I realized
my value wasn't in what I did for work, or even what I did during the day, but
rather, it was in the effort I put into my days. It was in the love that I
poured into my friends and the members of the gym. I am, in fact, 'busier' than
when I worked as a journalist, but I'm not getting paid. And that's okay!
Moral of the story, although it took me about 5
months to come to terms with my 'forced unemployment', I honestly couldn't be
happier. It’s reminded me, and really reinforced the fact, that my worth isn’t
in what I do, it’s in who I am.
