COMPANION PASS: Safety Third - Paige Champion

I read a quote once, by a man who I didn’t know, in a book I’d never heard of, that I pulled off a semi-empty bookshelf in a random hotel in Helena, MT... and it changed my life.

The quote read:

There is only one success- to be able to spend your life in your own way.

I read this while I was on a two-week hiatus from figure skating after the 2014 Olympic season.

My skating partner and I were both taking the time to “soul-search”. We basically were deciding whether to continue skating together, or to end our partnership and possibly retire, at the height of our careers.

I was a hot mess. I spent my time pretending I was fine with whatever decision we made, but inside, I was screaming.

I had just achieved the only thing I had ever deemed as worthy of dreaming of. In my mind -at the time- every other accomplishment paled, wilted and died in comparison to the Olympic experience.

Let me frame this for you- I had just achieved a dream I had fostered since I was 11 years old, only to return from that trip to the harsh reality that I was possibly going to have to quit my passion, my purpose and the love of my life. I was desperately grappling with the fact that whatever the hell I ended up doing in life after this point, would forever feel second best to what I had just lived out. And most terrifyingly of all, I had to face the fact that despite everything I had accomplished, outside of skating I had no idea of who I was, or what I wanted.

I was 24 years old. I had my whole life ahead of me. Yet I felt so lost, because I didn’t know which direction to go, which career to pursue- what to do with my life- that would have me feeling successful, confident and proud of myself again.

It was then that I read this quote.

And a rock of certainty settled into my gut. It reminded me that I have the power to define success: that my goals, aspirations, and how I measure my achievements are under my control.

I had spent the last 12+ years of my life chasing a dream that at times seemed improbable to me, and impossible to others. I had put my time, energy and resources into a dream that only a handful of people ever achieve, and I did it all because it was true to me and my vision. It was mine.

As I sat in that little hotel in Helena, Montana facing all of the uncertainties, pressures, norms, and expectations that were waiting for me outside of sport, I knew that no matter what happened, I was going to fight for the path that felt true to me and my vision of success.

And that’s when my motto of “Safety third” really took on a new light in my life.

“Safety third!” is an old family joke. A select few of my family members are quite accident prone… or rather, they aren’t overly proactive with safety measures at all times (*cough* post-pounder to the head *cough*finger through a log cutter...etc).

Just as the well-known saying “Safety first” commonly preludes the use of certain safety measures, my family’s humorous utterance of “Safety third” has become the swan song for an activity gone wrong. Anyone who knows my family well, understands the joke.

When I started skating pairs, I quickly learned that, as a “pair girl”, there was no room on the ice for fear or playing it safe. Fear based reactions created catastrophes (and in case you didn’t know - ice ain’t soft when you fall from 8 feet!) It truly is a remarkable feeling to skate fast enough that your eyes water. To then be lifted over your partner’s head (on one hand, flipped upside down, and then cartwheeled out of it back to the ice) or thrown 15 feet across the ice (spinning three times in the air and landing on one tiny blade at the same speed you went it to it with), is unlike anything else.

But working under these conditions, there is no room for hesitation.

If I let myself feel scared when learning a new element, I would have missed the opportunity of trying something potentially awesome. When I let the idea of “playing it safe” rule my skating, I missed opportunities for growth and excellence. “Playing it safe” wouldn’t have gotten me to the Olympics.

So, I took the family joke and made it my motto. “Safety third” became synonymous with being gritty, adventurous, and bold. I became fearless. I became relentless. I became unstoppable.

If you watch videos of me skating, you can often hear the commentators remarking on my motto of “safety third”; it became a part of my identity and image, and to this day I smile at that. I love how I showed up as a figure skater.

Since retiring, my life has changed drastically and in ways that I could never have imagined. I am extremely fortunate to have found the human I am meant to walk through life with, I have the best support group a girl could dream of, and I am loving the process of building my career around empowering entrepreneurs and business leaders.

Life. Is. Great.

And yet I still struggle. Daily. I struggle to stay true to myself. This world- at times- can make me feel as though I’m stuck between two competing forces.

I have my freedom of choice, but also feel compelled to deal with the traditional expectations of what I should choose. I see people being celebrated as individuals yet compared to the masses; society challenges us to create new and novel ideas but in the same breath is chastising for breaking societal norms. For me, learning to navigate through the tug-of-war of what everyone else thinks, believes and wants, while focusing on myself -my thoughts, beliefs and wants- has been a challenging, tiring, tearful and an always-changing balance of forces.

This is where “safety third” has continued to be my saving grace. It’s the reminder I need to remove myself from the tug-of-war, and to show up as the fearless, relentless and unstoppable woman that I am. I did it in my skating career, and now I’m living it in my second career.

But as life has evolved, the meaning of this motto has also changed.

“Safety third” has become the push I need to pursue my dreams regardless of what that looks like to other people. It is why I say YES to opportunities that I normally would shy away from (hello writing for Companion Pass!). It’s what I whisper to myself as I take a leap of faith and take on a new project, task, or goal that I may not feel qualified or prepared for (buh-bye nasty little negative self-talk goblins). It’s the gentle but firm nudge towards whatever task I can feel myself procrastinating on because it challenges me, makes me uncomfortable, or whatever other flimsy excuse I have.

“Safety third” is no longer only a reminder to myself to be fearless, it pushes me to fully show up in life, and to pursue my version of success while being unapologetically myself.

I’m realizing that life is gloriously imperfect, and hell, so am I! I am working on building a life- relationships, a marriage, a career and a voice- where I give myself permission to be imperfect, while holding myself accountable to being the absolute best version of myself I can be.

Because maybe, by learning to work through my own shit- so I can show up as myself in a world that pushes and pulls us in all sorts of directions- I can add value to other lives... or at the very minimum, at least be happy!

I don’t know what life looks like for you, what you’ve lived through or what you’re facing now, but I hope that despite it all, or better yet -because of it all- in a world where our own thoughts can be drowned out by the opinions, pressures and expectations from everyone and their dog, you are able to listen to the whisper in your heart that is telling you who you are. I hope you have the courage to listen to that voice, to know that you are enough, and to create the life that is true to you. Because the world needs YOU, not just a replica of someone else.

And sure, maybe that sounds scary as hell, but all I have to say to that, my dear friends, is- safety third!