When you envision a super hero, you don’t think about their alter ego’s responsibilities. You think about the super hero costume, the cape, the super powers, and the glory of saving the world. You don’t think about how these heroes launder their costumes, what they eat for dinner, and their day jobs. On the flip side, most Guiders I know only think about their alter ego responsibilities. We focus on the fact that we are moms and partners, we have careers or are furthering our education, we have grocery shopping and laundry to do. Very rarely are Guiders able to sit back and enjoy their success as a Guider, mainly because we’re so busy. But also because sometimes we don’t give ourselves enough credit.

But every once in a while, in the midst of ignoring all of those mundane alter ego tasks, Guiding lets me become Super Guider. I am armed with camping equipment and glue guns, I have an arsenal of badges and craft supplies at the ready, I am prepared to lead my unit into amazing adventures, and make sure they all go home safe at the end of the meeting. My super powers include creativity and micro managing, filling out forms, and giving 100% to performing silly camp songs. When I have a successful meeting—one of those meetings where the girls all rush over to their parents at the end and say “Guess what we did tonight?!”—I know I’ve done my Super Guider job right.

Most nights it’s great to go home at the end of the meeting and take off that uniform. It’s usually been a long day at work, followed by scrambling to gather the materials you want for the meeting you wished you’d had time to plan and hopefully gulping down some dinner, followed by a very high energy two-hour meeting and a half hour of vacuuming glitter out of a church basement carpet. I’m sure the super heroes do the same thing after a whole day of keeping up that alter ego pretence and then a whole night of saving the world. But sometimes I like to keep that uniform on, and give myself the credit I deserve. I may not have actually saved the world, but in my mind, I’ve done my part.

Guest post by Cori Kulbaba. Cori is the Contact Guider for the 214th Guides, and District Commissioner for University District in Winnipeg, MB. She has nine years in Guiding as both a girl and an adult, and her favourite thing about Guiding is camping.

Do you know a Super Guider? Do you have a Super Guiding Story to share? We want to hear from you! Email us your blog idea: ggcblog(at)girlguides.ca