Going First

One Friday afternoon in February I sat down to watch a virtual keynote I’d recently delivered to a live leadership development event. While the message was good, my delivery was anything but. I certainly wouldn’t have been inspired by me if I was watching me. Granted, it was the day after the sudden death of my brother, and I knew I could give myself a pass for that. But even still. The energy, juice and mojo that usually characterize my work were missing. Were they gone for good? Could I get them back? Was I losing my relevance?

The following Monday I wrote an email to two friends about the experience of watching myself in sub-par action. The three of us have had a standing monthly virtual meeting for several years now, and together have created a safe space where we can show up in whatever state we find ourselves. Once I started my email to them, the words wouldn’t stop. Lump in my throat, I uncovered a fear that has been lurking inside for some time, and the longer it lurks, the stronger its grip.

Re-reading what I had written, it felt so raw, so real, and so exposed, that I was tempted to hit delete.

I hit send instead.

“As much as I believe in the beauty of aging, and the importance of doing everything I can to be the very best, most vibrant, strong, wholehearted, and attractive me possible, and of being an example of what real aging looks like to my daughters and the world at large, it is a lot easier said than done when it's me staring back at me.”

Both friends got back to me in short order. Not with words about why I shouldn’t feel that way, or to boost my confidence, but with gratitude for having told the truth, and inviting a conversation they were eager to have and in need of themselves.

Putting my experience into words and sharing them loosened fear’s grip, and paved the way for me to find a new interpretation of an old story. Rather than sliding into irrelevance with each new trip around the sun, I am being invited to step into my role as a teacher of the well and hard earned wisdom collected along my way. I can even say that I’m (mostly) looking forward to bringing my communication skills to a new kind of stage.

As it turned out, after watching the video, one of those same friends left me a voice mail that brought us both to tears. While my message might not have been delivered in the visual way I would have wished, she said that she couldn’t take notes fast enough on what I’d shared, and it paved her way for a new interpretation of an old story too.

That’s what happens when we tell the truth.

What happens is that we find out that we are not alone.

What happens is that we give other people permission to tell the truth too.

What happens is that we start a conversation where it is safe to tell the truth, which in the long run, is the only kind of conversation worth having.

Ours is an if-you-show-me-yours maybe I-will-show-you-mine kind of culture. It simply feels too risky to go first, and so usually, no one does. Better safe, isolated with our own fear, pain and insecurity, than risk being sorry to have shared them at all. It’s a vicious cycle. One that can only be broken when someone dares to go first.

The Guy In The Camo-Hat

We are all one family who have forgotten who we are.

~ Rhonda V. Magee - The Inner Work of Racial Justice

He walked into my favorite local farm store just as I was about to check out with my basket full of produce, birdseed, and farm-fresh eggs. Tall and imposing with a long beard fashioned into what is sometimes referred to a Viking beard, the expression on his face was anything but warm and friendly. He was dressed in khaki hunting pants and a short-sleeve t-shirt, a camo hat pulled low over his eyes. And, he was packing a semi-automatic pistol on his hip. Accompanied by a woman wearing a mask, he had a young German Shepard on a leash. The woman with him was small in stature and, to my eye, seemed timid and submissive, as if she had acquiesced any personal power and agency to him.

I was grateful that I was wearing the mask that I diligently use during these strange and scary COVID-19 times. Thankful that I can do even this simple small thing to protect my fellow citizens, yes, but also grateful that he was unable to see the look on my face—a look that would have let him know that I knew his story and was disgusted by it. Everything about this guy in the camo-hat smacked to me of white supremacy, white nationalism, an unflinching commitment to the least restrictive interpretation of Second Amendment rights, and the relegation of women to their place behind men. I could feel my anger rising up as I considered all the ways in which what this man surely stood for are undermining our country and threatening our democracy. How, with people like him on the rise, can we have a shred of hope for ever achieving “liberty and justice for all”?

Climbing back into our car my thoughts continued to unspool about why people feel the need to wear a gun in public, not to mention a semi-automatic one. What felt like low-level adrenaline coursed through my body as I continued to focus on all the things I imagined when encountering the guy in the camo-hat. This went on all afternoon as we went about our bi-weekly essential activities trip into town.

And then it dawned on me.

I knew nothing about the guy in the camo-hat.

Not his name, the cards life had dealt him, or how he has chosen to play them.

Nothing.

In the time it would have taken him to draw his weapon, I had made up a story about him based on my own stereotypes and biases, and then proceeded to believe every imaginary word. It was the kind of story that separates us from our fellow human beings. The fear-based story of Us vs Them. The weaponized story that is undermining our country and threatening our democracy.

What if his story wasn’t anything like the one I had been telling myself since I first laid eyes on him. What if he was an off-duty policeman whose family had been threatened due to an earlier arrest and conviction? What if he was veteran committed to training therapy dogs for military members who were living with trauma-induced PTSD? What if the woman he was with wore a mask because she had a compromised immune system from treatment for cancer? What if she stayed close to his side because he was the love of her life who had seen her through her illness?

What if?

I can remember the exact spot on the road when this new story made it’s way into my closed and biased heart. There was a perceptible change in my body. Everything softened and opened up. My heart made room for this man I didn’t know. Like me, is he afraid for our country, and if so, why? Like me, does he love his family and friends with a love that runs deep and wide? Like me, has he been battered and bruised by painful life experiences? Like me, does he have knee-jerk reactions to others as a way to protect himself from those he fears?

I may never learn his real story.

It is certainly possible that the story I made up has a loud ring of truth to it. Even if it does, I can only hope that my encounter with the guy in the camo-hat will help me remember what so many of us seem to have forgotten. We are family, and we belong to each other. Which is why, tomorrow when I head out on a nearby logging road for a hike, I will be sure and wear my favorite hat to help me remember.

We are family.

We belong to each other.

Not The Whole Book

Whenever we are in the midst of something where we can’t see over the horizon of our current hurdle, heartache, or hardship, we can feel trapped. It can be hard to fathom that eventually we will make it over, through, or to the other side of whatever it is. It will always be like this whispers the voice that shows up in the middle of the night.

No.

It won’t.

We forget that our life is a book, and that whatever is going on, it isn't the whole book.

It is a chapter in that book, or a page in that chapter, or a sentence on that page, or a word in that sentence, or even a letter in that word.

Whatever it is, it’s not the whole book.

And.

Whatever it is, let’s make it a meaningful part of our story.

Photo: Pixabay on Pexels.com

Story Time

“You have to understand, my dears, that the shortest distance between truth and a human being is a story.”

~ Anthony De Mello

“The shortest distance between two people is a story.”

~ Patti Digh

Finding our way to the truth can be tricky.

A story can help.

Finding our way to one another can be tricky.

A story can help.

If ever we needed to live in the truth, and in connection to one another, it is now. Sharing our stories is a good place to start.

Photo by Maël BALLAND from Pexels

I'll Show You Mine

“Every person has a story with the power to crack you wide open.”

Oprah

We are story tellers at heart, and we see ourselves in one another’s stories.

Why is it then, that we are so reluctant to actually tell our stories? The real ones. The messy ones. The ones that don’t have happy endings. The ones where we still haven’t figured it all out yet. I’m not talking about blurting everything out behind the cyber curtain on some social media platform, but in real life conversations, with real people, in appropriate settings.

When I was writing BLUSH: Women & Wine, it took me a long time to talk openly about my love, and my misuse, of wine. This was partly because I knew that I had my own hard work to do to figure it all out. But it was also because there was some shame connected to the reliance I had on my nightly wine to cope with the stress and painful parts of my life, and fear of what others would think if they knew. Shame and fear keep our stories under our carefully crafted wraps.

One day, in the midst of a catch-up phone conversation with a friend, she asked me what I’d been up to. Without thinking, I blurted out my story of the book I was writing about my relationship with wine, and my use of it as a very classy looking coping mechanism. There was a long, awkward silence on the other end of the phone, and I immediately regretted my impulsive vulnerability. But then she said, “You’re talking about me. But I would have been too embarrassed to talk about it if you hadn’t said something first.”

When it comes to our very human stories that connect us with all the other human stories, why wait?

Let’s be the ones to go first.

How It Works

Make something marvelous.

Create a compelling story about it.

Share the story with those who want to hear it.

That’s how it works.

Take Pop’s Eggnog for example. As I wrote in a recent post, this marvelous holiday concoction has been a tradition in our family dating back to the 1930’s, when Pop (my dad) and a few fraternity brothers made a batch together. Fast forward to November 19, 2018, and that same eggnog is being served up at Solstice Wood Fire Cafe & Bar, a kick-ass establishment that serves up food and drink that showcase the best local and seasonal Gorge and Pacific Northwest ingredients. Said establishment also happens to be managed by Pop’s youngest granddaughter.

Solstice decided to offer Pop’s Eggnog and share the story of how it made its way from a kitchen in a fraternity house more than 80 years ago, to the kitchen of one of the Columbia River Gorge’s most beloved restaurants. They’ve made something marvelous. The’ve created a short, but compelling story about it. They’ve shared that story with those who want to hear it.

And Pop’s Eggnog? It’s flying off the shelves.

That’s how it works.

Here’s the thing: What worked for Pop’s Eggnog can work for us too.

Make something marvelous. It doesn’t have to change the whole world, just the world of those who want what we have to offer.

Create a compelling story about it. It doesn’t have to resonate with everyone, just with those who want what we have to offer.

Share the story. It doesn’t have to reach every audience, just the audience that wants what we have to offer.

That’s how it works.