“I Am Proud to Be Maladjusted”

Let’s take it back, way back for some us, myself included, to 1963. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was giving a speech on civil rights and segregation. During that speech he used a term that I had not heard before, he said we need to be “Maladjusted”. Most folks are familiar with the term adjustment, it basically means to correct or straighten, or to make “normal”. Now maladjusted, wouldn’t that mean the opposite? In the context that Dr. King was using it that’s is exactly what it means, because in 1964 segregation was normal, discrimination was not only normal but an accepted practice and a way of life. He was saying in order for us to advance we had to make these things not “normal”. We had to move past our differences solely based on our color in order to obtain a better way of life for all.

With that in mind, I want you to take a moment and think about what you have made normal in your life that you know shouldn’t be, what you have adjusted too. What is your definition of “normal” and do you accept that definition or is it just an easy way to feel comfortable.

In order to become maladjusted we have to get uncomfortable. We have to have unpopular conversations, not just other people but with ourselves as well. You have to get to a place where self-accountability is the number one thing on your checklist. You have to get to a place where conforming to normal is uncomfortable because normal exists in a state of contentment.

In order to become maladjusted you have to challenge those things in your life that you know are keeping you from growing. I want you all to read this into your memory. I’m proud to be maladjusted, because I will no longer put these “normal” things above my self-development. I will no longer accept things that are not for my good. I will no longer allow myself to be comfortable with just being.

Let’s paint a picture and make it plain. Let’s say you have grown accustomed to a certain lifestyle. Rather that be from you parents or significant other, but what happens when that changes, when you get out on your own into the REAL WORLD. The “my way or the highway” mentality does not fly, pouting and temper tantrums will only get you things you don’t want and a reputation that you don’t deserve. Eventually the shoulders you found to cry on and take pity on your “woe is me” stories will disappear, now what. Along the way you decided that behavior was normal, and you never took the time to be real with yourself, you never became maladjusted and you fail.

Being maladjusted does not necessarily mean conforming to all the norms that society has laid out. For example, just because you come from a disadvantaged neighborhood does not mean you should assimilate to the violence and down-trodden spirit that can grow in some of those places. On the other end of the spectrum, just because you come from wealth does not mean you should look down at those that don’t.

There is so much more that we are called to be, we were not meant just to work, pay taxes, get old and die. So, the question is going to be, where you see those comas, what are you going to do with those spaces, those are just place holders waiting to be filled. Become maladjusted, live your life to the best of your ability every day and understand that just because it can be accepted does not make it normal.