The Voice Not To Be Listened To

It’s hard to know how to be in the world right now. How to stay in it, work in it, and remain connected to what matters. My middle of the night thoughts cast doubt in every direction. How did it all come to this? How much more can we all take? Is the world really a lost cause? I’ll be honest with you. There are times when I think it is. And if I stop there, I might as well call it quits and just stay in bed.

But I can’t quit. And neither can you. Each one of us adds to the world what no one else can. We aren’t called to love, help, and heal the whole world. Just the one that is within our reach.

I’m not sure who or what force is behind evil, but I do believe it exists. And one of the things evil would want me to accept is that individual effort doesn’t matter. It does. My contribution matters, regardless of the outcome, and so does yours. Any voice that would tell us otherwise is not to be listened to.

Like I said, it’s hard to know how to be in the world right now. With problems so big, divides so deep, and fear so rampant, who am I to think that I can make one whit of difference?

Actually, I’m the only one who can. And so are you.

Hope As A Practice

Every day we get to choose whether to give

the microphone to hope or fear.

The choice we make is the life we’ll lead.

Bob Goff

Someone recently shared this quote with me, and I couldn’t agree more. The words ring true in my head and my heart and in my experience.

However.

Especially now, there are days when I am in need of the tiniest of victories, and choosing to listen to the voice of hope in the morning is no guarantee that it will stay with me for the day. Fear can ambush me at any moment, and when it does, I have to choose to pry the microphone out of fear’s ferocious grip, and place it firmly back in the hands of hope. And then do it again. Hope is a practice.

Hope isn’t seeing the silver lining in a pit of despair. It is mining for the gold that is found buried deep in the heart of struggle.

Hope isn’t looking at the bright side of dark realities. It is choosing to be a light in dark times.

Hope isn’t passive. As I was reminded by someone recently, it requires something of us. It calls on us not to just choose it, but to work for it. Not to just wait for it, but to watch for it. To pursue it by pushing toward something better.

Like I said. Hope is a practice.

Photo by egil sjøholt from Pexels

Photo by egil sjøholt from Pexels











Go Forth and...Give Voice!

My good friend and colleague David Berry wrote an exquisite book about leadership. More specifically, A More Daring Life talks about the importance of finding our own voice of leadership at the crossroads of change. He presents this concept of voice through three distinctly different yet intricately connected lenses: The Voice of Understanding, The Voice of Connection, and, The Voice of Exploration. I'd tell you more, but then you might not do what I hope you'll do, which is to get your hands on your own copy and take a deliciously deep dive into his pages. I can't think of better fodder to kick off the year!

A few days ago, I wrote my first blog of the new year about my search for new marching orders for 2017.  Simply put, they are to Go Forth each and every day and bring all that I have to offer to a waiting world. The necklace with those two words, Go Forth, the one I wear every day and that is pictured in that blog, sits squarely between my head and my heart. And, as I learned from David's book, so does something else. My voice. He recounts an experience of discovering that on him, exactly midway between his cerebral cortex and the middle of his chest, sits his voice box. That discovery led him to the insight that it is our voice that connects our head and our heart, and that we need both in order to live and lead well. It is our voice that connects our cerebral gray matter with our blood-red hearts, conveying both what we know and how we feel, what we think and what we believe.

These are trying times. Uncertainty, strife, fear and divisive forces seem to be at work all around us. Strident voices shout from every possible outlet, and they seem to be either emotionally charged but without thoughtful substance, or a spewing of cold hard data without any heartfelt warmth. I probably can't change that tide. And neither can you. But I can bring a different kind of voice to my days, and a different kind of message to all whom I encounter. And so can you. If ever there was a need for intelligent, wholehearted communication it is now. Inside our homes and in our houses of worship, in our places of work and the gyms in which we work out, on the street and at the checkout counter, in the airport ticket line and in the evermore cramped seats on the plane, in our social media conversations and in our social circles. Everywhere life is hungry to hear thoughtful, heartfelt words meant to help and to heal, to inform and to inquire, to encourage and to empower, to challenge and to change. 

The power of our voice is immense. Our voice can change the world for good, but only when powered by both head and heart.

Go Forth and...Give Voice!

The Art of the Question

In twenty-something years of coaching and facilitating, if I've learned only one thing, it is that people can almost always find their way to their own answers. My job is to create the space within with they can engage in their own courageous thinking in order to hear their own courageous answers. The right question, at the right time is an invitation to step through our own inner doorway and into that space so that we can hear ourselves think. I can tell when I've posed the right question to a client or a roomful of clients, because there is almost always a look of "knowingness" that crosses their faces. They know the answer because they've been asked the right question.

The questions we ask lead to the answers we find.

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