Hello, my name is:

Fingerprints by kevindooley

Awhile back, I wrote about my failed attempt to rename myself and the lingering desire to try it again. To sum up the original story: During my freshman year of college, I tried to add a vowel to the end of my name in hopes that it would make me stand out from the sea of Jenn's in my generation. Due to a friend's honest question and my timidity, it didn't stick.

But over the past year, I've realized that the name Jenna calls to me, beyond my desire to be different . There's something about it that appeals to me. I wondered if it could feel like home, but I wasn't sure I was ready to rename myself. In June, I wrote, "Names get into our being. They're part of the story we tell to ourselves and about ourselves. I don't know if I can cast aside Jenn or Jennifer for Jenna."

Three months after writing that, I decided to take Jenna out for a test run. I've always been fascinated with the idea of going to a place where nobody knows me and creating a new persona for myself; not because I'm ashamed of who I am in my "real" life, but because so often I get bogged down in who I'm expected to be. Or more accurately, who I'm accustomed to being, which, despite my best attempts to live authentically, does not always line up with who I really am or want to be.

So in September, I traveled to the woods of New Hampshire to meet more than 100 strangers at the Squam Art Workshops. I "knew" a few of the women there through blogging, but had met none of them in person and had never spoken with any of them on the phone. The extent of our interaction had been reading and commenting on each others' blogs and sharing an occasional email. It was as good a place as any for my name experiment.

Two months earlier, I trotted out my new name a few times while at BlogHer in San Francisco, but I had a hard time being consistent with it because I'd already met several of the people there. I wasn't completely ready to commit to that extra letter.

But for five days in New England, I said, "Hi, my name is Jenna." For five days, I heard people say, "Hey, Jenna...." and then realized they were talking to me. If I'm being completely honest, I felt like I was lying about my identity. It was just one tiny extra syllable on top of "Jenn," but I may as well have introduced myself as Mathilda. My own name sounded foreign to me.

And yet, I stuck with it during the whole retreat. I resisted the urge to abandon my experiment and fall back on the familiar. So now a whole group of people know me as Jenna. I told one of my closest and oldest friends about this experiment, and she admitted that she could never think of me as a Jenna. I understand that. The verdict is still out on whether or not I can.

Then today I read something that Karen Maezen Miller wrote on her blog:

Our mind is so swiftly conditioned to an acquired understanding of names and labels. Like all forms of delusion, we attach and identify erroneously with names when they are just tools. Identifying yourself with a certain name is like mistaking the fork for the food.

It reminds me of Popeye's famously jaunty song: I yam what I yam, and that's all that I yam.

I am Jennifer/Jennie/Jenn/Jenna Ann McGuiggan. Call me what you will, I'm still me. And that's all that I yam.

Squam Interview on BlogHer

me, as seen by beth from more doors

I was tickled pink when Jen Lemen asked to interview me about my experience at Squam Art Workshops for her Art & Design column on BlogHer. You can read it here.

I'm concerned that my last post about Squam makes it seem like I had a lousy time there. That's not true. As usual, the truth is multifaceted. The truth is, I did feel socially awkward and like I didn't get the experience I'd hoped for. The truth also is that I met some wonderful people, made some exciting new friends, and learned a lot about art and myself. It's all the truth. The truth is messy. And I'm (learning to be) okay with that.

So if you're feeling like a social misfit and want someone to commiserate with, read my last post. But if you're wondering what it was like for a word-loving writer to be thrust into the woods with more than 100 image-making artists, read the interview.

Only Connect: The truth I SAW

me, as seen by Melissa Piccola

I want to tell you the magical tale of 120 women (and a few men) in the woods of New Hampshire, gathered together for art making and soul digging. I want to write about the lovefest that was Squam Art Workshops: how we were inspired, our artful souls lifted high above the trees that grow so straight and true around Squam Lake; how deep, soulful bonds were formed and first time meetings felt more like reunions of old friends; how we surprised ourselves with our own abilities, our similarities to one another, and our capacity to connect.

I've read so many blog posts from SAW attendees that touch on or delve into these very things. I want to tell you that magical tale, but it's not my story. I wish it was. But mine is messier, less cheery. I'm still deciding if it's less magical.

I wish I'd spent five days feeling elated and connected and rooted and artful. Instead, I spent a lot of that time feeling disconnected, tentative, needy, and bothersome.

Epiphany in the Woods

One afternoon at SAW, I found myself walking to the dining hall alone, feeling sorry for myself. I tried to take in the beauty all around me, but felt completely separate from it. I silently berated myself for being a killjoy, for being awkward, for being alone at that very moment when surely everyone else was deep in the throes of exhilarating conversation with their new found soul sisters. Then I had a small epiphany: "Oh. This always happens to me when I go away."

I remembered how a similar feeling of disconnect and discontent followed me around like a palpable presence in San Francisco at BlogHer this year; how even after the conference, while sightseeing with friends, I couldn't shake this specter of sadness. The same thing happened the year before at BlogHer in Chicago, even though I'd fulfilled my wishlist of "BlogHer deliverables."

I realize now that this feeling is achingly familiar. I felt it as a teenager in a very small high school; as a college student with a diverse group of friends; as a young volunteer in a foreign country; in various jobs that quietly killed my spirit. All my life, I've battled the feeling that I'm on the fringe of things.

Why do I always feel like an outsider, even when I'm somewhere I want to be, doing something I want to do, with people I want to be with? Feeling this way unnerves me, confuses me, saddens me. It flies in the face of all that I hold most dear.

At My Core

During Andrea Scher's Superhero Life session at SAW, we did a life coaching exercise to uncover our core values: the ideals that act as our guiding principles; our highest hopes and expectations; the traits we most cherish and respect. I was sweetly surprised when the exercise led me straight to the things I already knew I loved.

My first core value is Joy & Wonder. For me, this means living with my eyes and heart wide open, loading up my life with things big and small that bring me joy and fill me with wonder. It means seeing magic and beauty all around me, much like Anne of Green Gables and so many of the bloggers I love.

I wrote about Joy & Wonder in my 2007 Retrospective:

For the first time that I can remember, I had days when I was just happy to be alive. Each day suddenly held beauty and joy and meaning. I was shocked to realize that I was excited about the coming day; that I looked forward to the possibility of getting up tomorrow and seeing what would happen. This new sense of euphoria left me breathless. For so long I've wanted to live a life of joy and wonder. And for so long, it escaped me. I finally realized that I had to create such a life if it would not just come to me. Of course, the more I sought to create it, the more it came to me.

My second core value is Connection. The fullness of this word for me is complex, but part of it means that I need to connect with people to be happy. I savor time alone, but I need big doses of deep conversation and riotous laughter with kindred spirits. I need this connection in order to feel whole. Without enough of it, it's hard to live with Joy & Wonder.

Come Away With Me

I don't know why I have this fringe problem. How much of it is insecurity clouding my judgement of how people view me? How much of it are those nasty internal gremlins preventing me from connecting? During The Superhero Life, Andrea said that the gremlins' job is to keep us safe. When they whisper that we aren't capable of something, we're tempted not to try. And if we don't try, the gremlins protect us from the pain of potential failure. Perhaps mine tell me that I can't connect in order to protect my heart from the pitfalls that come with living so wide open.

I want to tell you the magical tale of 120 women in the woods of New Hampshire, but for now I can only tell you the story of me. My art retreat experience did not go how I'd hoped. But it's opened my eyes to some important truths about how I experience the world, including how I experience myself and other people.

I came away from SAW feeling sad and a little bruised. But I think this has little to do with the event and the people, and much to do with me.