4.1 Relationship courage
When I first had to supervise staff, I couldn’t have started out more backwards because…
I didn’t want to do supervision.
I wanted staff to…
Manage themselves.
Like, just do your work so I don’t ever have to deal with any stupid personnel issues.
What put me in that mood? Past jobs…
I remembered seeing lots of conflict and I didn’t like any of it. For example, a supervisor who made a perfectly innocent comment to a staff person who took major offense and blew up all over her and bullied her behind it for the next two months. I didn’t ever want that to happen to me.
I remembered supervisors who staff gossiped about mercilessly. But I wanted everybody to like me.
I remembered supervisors who were not good at setting limits so their staff did a lot of goofing off and not much work. And I knew I was not good at setting limits.
I remembered, too, stellar supervisors who I loved working for, but I didn’t understand what they were doing that made them so effective. I figured it was something about their personalities and I wasn’t very much like them.
So no wonder I wasn’t eager to become a supervisor. And when it came to doing the tough correction conversations, I was just plain scared.
But I didn’t like being scared, so I came up with a way to protect myself, which was my…
Wizard of Oz strategy.
I would put on my best professional persona, adopt a cool attitude, and keep the staff at arm’s length. I imagined myself hiding behind the Wizard’s curtain out of the line of fire where nothing could touch me while I calmly managed by remote control.
And immediately you can see the problem…
When I stepped back and away from the staff person, she felt disregarded, maybe even abandoned.
Instead of using our working relationship to build a stronger alliance, I stepped away from the relationship. So it looked like I didn’t care, which wasn’t true. I was just afraid.
When I look back, I can see…
I was bringing the fear to the party.
Sure I put on my neutral face and used my reasonable voice, but jeez, what was I thinking? The staff person knew this was going to be a correction conversation. Her antennae were up. She was reading me carefully—me, not my pre-scripted words.
And what she read in me was my fear, so instead of reassuring her…
I was putting her in a state of alarm.
And now neither one of us was at our best and now both of us were much more susceptible to getting triggered and having the conversation go off the rails.
So…
In trying to protect myself I made things worse.
Then one day I was told I had to do a correction conversation with Teri. She was the shyest person on staff, not much of a presence, except when she did her teen workshops, and then wow! She held their attention. She got them thinking. Their eyes lit up. And afterward, they lined up to talk with her.
And there was one other time she came alive—when she was telling stories about people she knew. She was a remarkable observer of personal detail and a hilarious story teller. But she had an edge to her stories. You didn’t want her to ever pick you as her subject.
Well, she was our representative to the regional coalition and the day after one of their meetings the grapevine was buzzing. Gossip being contagious, it all got back to us in vivid detail, the replays of the stories she told about some of our staff. And it wasn’t just edgy stuff, it was just plain mean.
It was my job to fix this problem and I wasn’t not looking forward to this. I figured if I handled it badly and upset her, I would be featured in future stories as payback. Which was not an unreasonable assumption since I had been one of the people she skewered at the regional meeting.
My feelings were especially hurt because I liked Teri a lot. I admired her. After her mother died, she had been shuffled through seven foster homes between the ages of 13 and 19, and now here she was at 20, in spite of all the disruption and losses in her life, or maybe because of them, doing such very good work.
I was hurt but I was also mad at Teri. Not just about her trashing me…
I was mad that I had to have this conversation.
What I really wanted to do was pretend we hadn’t heard the gossip and ignore the whole thing.
It was in my job description, though, to go into this meeting and…what? Kick some butt? Work some magic?
I had no idea what I was going to do, but as I walked into the room here’s what I saw…
A talented young woman with a very good heart who was in trouble.
She had hurt five people who, I was quite sure, mattered to her.
And my first thought was…
Oh. That means she needs my help.
Right there was a call to advocacy, though I didn’t understand it then. But unconsciously I shifted into…
Caring about her and taking a stand for her, instead of correcting her.
Instead of pushing for a quick resolution, I kicked back and started asking questions. And this conversation I expected to be chilly, or worse, warmed right up…
Rich: We heard what you said about us at the coalition meeting. You hurt our feelings.
Teri: I didn’t mean for that to happen.
Rich: What did you mean to have happen?
Teri: I was just doing the thing I do.
Rich: Telling stories?
Teri: Yes. People like me when I do that.
Rich: Not the people who get talked about. We don’t like when you do that.
Teri: Oh. Okay.
Rich: What happened when you were at that meeting?
Teri: I forgot.
Rich: Forgot?
Teri: Who you are and what you mean to me.
Rich: Forgot, really?
Teri: Yes, really. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I wish I could take it all back.
Rich: I believe you mean that and it’s good to hear you say that, but help me understand.
What were you thinking?
Teri: I was just seeing those people respond to me and the more they responded the further I went. I know this is something I’ve got to stop.
Rich: What would help you stop?
Teri: I have no idea.
Rich: You know, all of a sudden it strikes me that I’ve never heard you gossip about the teens you work with. Not once.
Teri: Oh, God, no, I wouldn’t do that!
Rich: Why?
Teri: Because they’re kids. They’re too vulnerable. They don’t need that.
Rich: But adults…
Teri: I don’t know. They’re different. I don’t get it. Something gets started in me and it feels so good that I don’t stop.
Rich: What’s it like for you when you’re the center of attention like that?
Teri: Well, I want that. I’m sorry, but that’s true.
Rich: There’s nothing wrong with wanting attention.
Teri: But it doesn’t last. Driving home I kind of crashed into this sadness. A lot like emptiness.
Rich: Oh.
Teri: You don’t need to hear about my problems.
Rich: I’d be glad to if you want to tell me. See, I’m just as sure as I can be that you don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.
Teri: No, I really, really don’t. It’s just that apart from when I tell stories, I’m such a nobody.
Rich: What about when you’re doing workshops with the teens?
Teri: Oh, I didn’t think about that. Yes, then I matter. That’s something new for me. Just since I started working here.
Rich: And what’s it like for you after a workshop? Sadness? Emptiness?
Teri: No, I feel calm. I feel good. And that stays with me.
Rich: So what are we going to do about the story telling?
Teri: I don’t know, something. Talking with you right now I don’t feel proud of it.
Rich: What about learning how to do positive stories, appreciative stories?
Teri: No, I think I need to stay away from stories for now. I think they’re poison for me. I think I need to focus on other ways of being with people. But I don’t know if I can do it. When the story telling gets a grip on me it just takes over.
Rich: Look, I don’t have an easy answer for you. I wish I did, but I don’t. But I would like to work with you on this if you want. I’d really like to see you to come out the other side of this.
Teri: I’d appreciate that. But I just have this sense that it’s not going to be easy.
Rich: That’s okay. You’re important to us. We want you to stay here with us for a long time. So I’m willing to work with you on this.
Teri: Thank you for not hating me.
Rich: My feelings were really hurt, but that’s because you matter to me.
Teri: Oh.
Rich: Now what about the others?
Teri: I need to apologize. That’ll be embarrassing, but I need to do it. I’ll go around and talk to each of them today. But…
Rich: What?
Teri: What if I do it again? And then again. I don’t have this thing under control.
Rich: Yeh, that’s a hard one. What I can think of is to tell people that you’re sorry and you’re working on it and you’re committed to getting it solved but it might take some time. Everyone here knows what a good heart you have.
Teri: They do? How?
Rich: From seeing you work with the teens. It’s so visible then.
Teri: That’s a relief to hear. You know when I apologize I’m going to ask them to tell me in detail how they felt when they hear what I said about them. I want to hear them out. Maybe that’ll help drive it home to me how wrong this is.
Rich: Okay, but I want to make sure you’re not doing some kind of self-punishment thing, because I don’t see how that could help.
Teri: No, I’m not thinking of it like that. I think I need to get into their world and get a feel for what it’s like to be somebody I talk about. Maybe something like empathy.
Rich: Oh, that sounds good. And I’m thinking right now that I want us to focus on positive ways you can get attention, the kind that lasts.
Teri: Okay. But what about the coalition meetings? Do you want to take me off that assignment?
Rich: Actually, no. Not yet. What if we try this. Next time you go up there, when you arrive, give me a call. We’ll talk for a few minutes about why you like the people here in order to help you remember who we are to you. And then before you hit the road to drive back, call again to check in. Bookend the meeting. Would that help you stay anchored so you won’t be tempted to tell stories?
Teri: If you’re willing, I’d like to try that. It just might work. And that would be a good step forward if it did.
I wish I had known back then what I know now. I could have been much more helpful to Teri much more quickly.
But I’m so thankful that in my naiveté I did that one right thing, I let my caring call forth just enough courage that I could claim the relationship, not even understanding what I was doing.
And I believe that’s what allowed us to have many more conversations as we ever so slowly figured things out together.
Everyday courage
“Courage” is an awfully big word. We use it to describe those utterly inspiring moments when someone reaches far beyond herself, perhaps in the face of danger, to do something remarkable, perhaps something life-saving or life-changing.
But on this page, I want to talk about…
Down-to-earth, everyday courage.
The kind that’s…
Uncommon but unspectacular.
The kind that’s…
Gutsy but not beyond you.
The key is to take just that one next step into relationship.
I like to call this nurturing courage. Yes, you’re doing something that takes moxie, but…
You’re stepping into possibility, not danger.
Let me add a caveat, though. There are days when you just don’t have it in you to take that next step…
Maybe you didn’t sleep well the night before and it’s all you can do to get through the day.
Maybe you’re exhausted from too many weeks in a row of too much work and you don’t have the bandwith to deal with staff issues right now.
Maybe you’re too mad at the staff person and you need some time out to get some distance and pull yourself together before you’re ready for an advocacy conversation.
If you’re having an off day, you get to take the day off from courage.
That’s the way I see it and I hope you’ll give yourself that permission. The word courage comes from the Latin root cor, meaning heart. It’s a matter of heart. It’s not a should or a duty.
And we can only do what’s in us to do. We can only take that next step that’s in us, stretch ourselves that much. And when we need to rest, we rest.
I’m saying this not to lower anyone’s ambitions, but as a way of saying please treat yourself with care and kindness.
Managing staff is a serious challenge. For many of us, it can take a long time to develop the kind of mastery we want. So instead of putting yourself down for what you are not yet able to do, please…
Take the steps you’re capable of today, knowing that if you take those steps today that will make you more capable tomorrow.
And if you’re just starting out as a supervisor, please don’t burden yourself with the expectation of mastery right out of the gate.
If you’re a veteran supervisor, if you’re someone who keeps taking on bigger and bigger challenges and you keep calling on your staff to play a bigger and bigger game, then you have to keep stepping up your game.
And always know that even a little bit of courage can make a very big difference…
When a staff person feels that you’re genuinely on her side, you can make mistakes and still the relationship will hold.
You don’t want to make mistakes, you want to make as few as possible, but if someone feels it in her bones that you’re doing your very best to stand with her and by her and for her, she will likely give you a whole lot more room to be human.
And when you demonstrate that you care about her, chances are good she will care about you in return.
Whenever I see nonprofits torn apart by personality battles or coalitions split into warring factions, I can’t help but think that the greatest source of pain in our activist world is…
Relationships gone wrong.
And when I see nonprofits or coalitions that are a little too quiet, I start thinking that our greatest source of ennui is…
Relationships gone flat.
And if that’s true then…
It’s in the area of relationships that we can make the most progress.
Subtext
I’ve read a bunch of books about writing novels and screenplays, not that I’m ever going to write either one of those. But I’m very interested in how conversations work.
The main piece of advice I’ve seen, again and again, is to make sure your dialogues are not…
On the nose.
Which is a way of saying, don’t let your characters say what they mean directly.
And why? Because, according to these writing teachers…
In real life most people are indirect.
Which I guess is great for ramping up drama, but I think it’s a problem for relationships. I think this advice implies that we have a pervasive problem in our society when it comes to conversational courage.
Subtext is a related topic I’m also very interested in. I want it to mean that when we engage each other, our conversations would have nuance, layers, flavors, vulnerability, and the kind of depth that would add richness to our relationships and would make our everyday interactions more intriguing and enjoyable.
But what the majority of the writing teachers mean when they talk about subtext is…
Keeping secrets.
Not revealing who you are or what your intentions are. Holding back on the full truth. Which is great for suspense, but wow does that ever cause trouble for our relationships.
The closer, the riskier
Say you’ve settled into a comfortable equilibrium with a friend, but you know there’s potential for more and you want that and decide to go for it.
Compared to negotiating with an adversary, it might seem that engaging someone you care about would be a breeze, but…
It can be scarier because of what’s at stake.
If you try to connect with an adversary and fail, nothing’s really changed. But what if you ask for more from a friend, trying to make things better, but you make things worse? What if she backs away or disappears on you? Now you’ve really lost something.
As always with the practice of relationship courage, there are no guarantees. But here’s what gives you your best chance of success when you ask a friend—or loved one, or acquaintance—to deepen their relationship with you…
First, you take your friend into your heart, then you invite her into a challenge.
And the more deeply she feels held by you, the bigger the challenge you can give her and it will still feel nurturing.
The organic approach to courage
Artificial courage is when you push yourself to be direct and forthright and gutsy because you feel you should, because you’re pressuring yourself from the inside or someone is pressuring you from the outside.
Truth is…
Shoulds sabotage what they supposedly support.
And that’s especially true with courage.
But moral-fight activism…
Gives us an organic path to courage.
The three disciplines of the Moral-Fight Operating System build courage in a natural way. When you do serious self-development and do it consistently, you differentiate yourself. And that means the ground you’re standing on within yourself is more and more solid. So being forthright becomes less and less risky.
And the more practice you get wrestling with the core dilemmas of being human, the better able you are to engage with the dilemmas of any particular relationship.
So if you want more courage in your life and your relationships, you don’t blast yourself with high-energy pep talks. Instead you dig deeper into self-development. You push through the initial hard passages until you begin to develop mastery and you get to enjoying the work.
And then courage starts showing up like a bonus reward.
The pleasure of mastery
In the days when I was assigned to supervision, I was never very good at it. But later, I got serious about learning what makes conversations work when they’re working best.
And so when I became a coach, I was able to help leaders turn correction meetings into courageous advocacy conversations. Which were not only effective but such a pleasure.
Ruth: Four staff, that’s all I’ve got, but even so I’m not ready to be a supervisor. I haven’t had any training. I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m just winging it. I’m scared I might make a mistake I can’t fix.
Rich: Tell me what’s good about being scared.
Ruth: I guess it means I’m taking this seriously.
Rich: And…
Ruth: It means I’m really motivated to do this well. I’ve got a great ED. I love how she works with me and I want to give that same experience to my staff.
Rich: Forget for a moment about the management thing and professional how-tos. Focus in on your four staff just as people. See them just as they are. Take them one by one, and tell me what you’re noticing, like…
What talents and strengths do you see in them?
Where do you think their growing edges are?
What blind spots might they have?
If you were their advocate, how would you work with them?
Ruth: Okay, here goes…
Danny does good work, but I keep feeling like he’s coasting, like there’s a whole lot more to him that we’re not seeing yet. I want to talk with him and discover what that is and see if he’s willing to challenge himself to take a big leap forward.
Delia is dynamite with the kids, but doesn’t know how good she is. She’s timid where she deserves to be confident. Which is my issue, too, so if she’s willing, I’d love to help her push through.
Don is achievement-oriented and self-sufficient and I’ve never known anyone quite like him. I’m glad to have him on my team but he puzzles me. I don’t know what to give him. Oh, but I could just ask him. I could ask him to teach me what he needs from me so I can be his ally.
And then there’s JJ, and, oy.
Rich: Oy?
Ruth: She’s the one I think about all the time. She’s a whiz at the website, database, and IT stuff, but she’s got this one thing she does that’s a deal breaker for me. She can take anything and give it a hurtful twist.
In a staff meeting, Delia told us about a breakthrough with one of her teens, and JJ, deadpan, said, “It’s about time.”
Don’s numbers hit the all-time record for our department and he was so happy, but JJ, pawing the air, said, “Down big fella.”
Danny’s dad died and he was teary in the staff meeting. JJ rolled her eyes and said, “Oprah time.”
Rich: What are you noticing about yourself right now?
Ruth: I get jazzed when I talk about my three D’s, but when I think about JJ the joy is gone.
Rich: Let’s focus on the D’s first. Listen back to how you talked about them.
Ruth: It was easy to talk about them. I like talking about them. I’m looking forward to working with them. I know I have a lot to learn, but I really want them to do well. Does that count as a hopeful sign about me being a supervisor?
Rich: I’d say so.
Ruth: Okay, that feels good.
Rich: What would you say matters most right now?
Ruth: That I care about my staff. But is that enough? There’s so much I don’t know.
Rich: I don’t think it’s enough. But if you were given this choice: either you care a lot about your staff or you know a lot about personnel management, which would you choose?
Ruth: Caring.
Rich: And why?
Ruth: Because that’s what makes everything else work.
Rich: What do you mean?
Ruth: Why would they listen to me if I don’t care about them?
Rich: For a paycheck?
Ruth: Oh, no, that’s not enough. That feels so cold. I couldn’t supervise people who were here just for the check. I wouldn’t do that to myself.
Rich: So what if we said that you already have the most important part of being a supervisor?
Ruth: That can’t be true.
Rich: I’m not asking you to brag about yourself, but just be as accurate as you can and tell me how much you care about your three D’s?
Ruth: A lot.
Rich: And do they know you care?
Ruth: Oh, yes. I’m very expressive. I let people know all the time how much I like them.
Rich: So how’s your relationship with the three D’s right now as you’re starting out?
Ruth: It’s already strong.
Rich: And that means…
Ruth: There’s an excellent chance they’ll stick with me as I go through my learning curve. Oh, that feels so much better. But then I think about JJ and she eclipses everything else.
Rich: If you were JJ’s champion what would you want for her?
Ruth: What I want for the others. It kills me to see her wrecking relationships she could be enjoying. She wanders around in her own world, a lonely soul as far as I can tell, and I don’t want it to be like that for her.
This thing she does is so destructive, but it’s just one thing. But maybe it’s too big to fix in the workplace. But what if it’s not? But then what if I try and I fail and that only makes things worse?
Rich: How much pressure do you feel to fix JJ?
Ruth: A Venti of pressure.
Rich: And what do you want your relationship with JJ to be?
Ruth: I want to be on her side, but only if she wants me to be on her side, only if she decides to let me be on her side. I don’t want to carry her. I don’t believe in that.
Rich: So what will you say to her?
Ruth: I’ll say…
“JJ, I want you to succeed here. But I want you to know I’m not like the former supervisor. I won’t let you slide. Your put downs have to stop. And I don’t mean you can get away with cutting back to 50%. I mean you have to stop 100%.
“Here’s who I am as a supervisor. I want each of my staff to do well in their work and be happy. I want a team where people back each other up instead of knocking each other down. That’s me and that’s not going to change. And I want you to know that.
“And I want you to know that I see you doing really good work. I want to keep you here. But not if you do put downs. And really, I can’t see anything those put downs are giving you. I only see you losing behind them. Want to talk about it? I really want you to stay here and be happy and I’m willing to work with you on this.”
Rich: You haven’t read any books about supervision? You haven’t been to any trainings?
Ruth: No, not yet.
Rich: Did you hear that stand you just took?
Ruth: I suppose so. No, I did, I did hear it.
Rich: And do you know that you don’t have to do this alone, dealing with JJ?
Ruth: I’ve been thinking I had to.
Rich: You get to ask your ED for advice and support. You get to call in an HR consultant if things get tough with JJ. You get to call in a personnel lawyer. You don’t have to let this burden you.
Just because you’re a supervisor doesn’t mean you have to be an HR expert. Learn the basics, but then call on the professionals when you need them. In fact, I recommend calling on them at the first sign of trouble.
Ruth: Like a nurse practitioner.
Rich: Yes.
Ruth: It helps to think of it like that. And uh-oh.
Rich: Uh-oh?
Ruth: Really uh-oh. Wow, all of a sudden this whole thing has flipped over.
Rich: Meaning…
Ruth: Suddenly, JJ feels easy and the others feel hard.
Rich: Hard?
Ruth: Much more challenging.
Rich: What are you seeing?
Ruth: It’s like the three D’s are out on a much bigger playing field. There’s so much more possibility for them. And that means there’s so much more for me to learn in order to support them. But it’s like JJ is standing on a tiny, scrunched up patch of ground with no wiggle room and nowhere to go.
Rich: So what about this question of caring versus knowledge?
Ruth: There’s so much more I want to learn and I can’t wait to learn it. Oh, I see where I want this to go.
My grandmother is my biggest fan and supporter. She was there for me when I was a kid. And then all through my teen years when I was going through big changes that I didn’t feel at all ready for.
She still wants to know everything that’s going on with me and I love telling her, because I always feel smarter when I’m talking with her and I figure things out in the process.
Rich: So with the three D’s…
Ruth: I want to be there for them like my grandma is for me. I keep going through changes and taking on new challenges and growing, and she keeps tracking me. She stays right with me. And that’s very, very big. And I want to learn how to do that with my staff. I want to be the kind of supervisor in whose presence they keep moving forward.
Rich: So here you are a brand new supervisor and what would you say you need?
Ruth: I need to care about my staff because that’s me. And I’ve already got that in spades. That’s not a problem.
I need help when I get scared or don’t know what to do. And I’ve got that in my ED, and if I need more help, like you said, I can go get it.
I need staff who want to be on my team and will let me care about them. I’ve mostly got that. Three out of four plus a very iffy maybe.
I need time to learn all the things I’m anxious to learn. So I guess I can give myself permission to pace myself.
Rich: And what matters is…
Ruth: Not that I’m a masterful supervisor in my first month of doing the job, but that I’m on the right track. And I can see that I really am on the right track.
Rich: And that means…
Ruth: From now on, I get to enjoy the trip.
Supervision can be daunting. Look that the standard personnel handbooks. Giant volumes with hundreds of pages packed with rules and regulations and strategies and warnings. And where do you even begin?
When I’m working with a new supervisor, here’s what I recommend. Learn the basic rules but still…
Start with your heart and let it lead you forward.
And when I’m working with veteran supervisors who have achieved mastery and know all the do’s and don’ts, I recommend still, in every supervision conversation, to…
Start with your heart and let it lead you forward.
More courageous together
Imagine Leon and Rory who work together in a nonprofit where everyone on staff is a decidedly post-hope person.
Leon: This is clobbering me.
Rory: What is?
Leon: This post-hope thing. I used to be able to look at the bad news about climate change and keep all that stuff at arms-length while I gave impassioned speeches and rallied people.
But in the past year, since hope disappeared on me, and in the six months I’ve worked here, I feel like I don’t have defenses anymore. The bad stuff just floods in. What used to be intellectual pain is now visceral pain.
And back when I was a rally master, I could go home at night and switch it all off. I could stop being an activist and just be a person with Lynnette. We had so much fun together.
Rory: And now?
Leon: Now our relationship is in trouble and it scares me. You’ve been post-hope longer than me. Have you got advice?
Rory: I don’t know about advice, but I can keep you company.
Leon: Like how?
Rory: When you’re down does it help to talk things through?
Leon: Yeh, but I haven’t been doing that with anyone.
Rory: Then I’m volunteering. How about this. Every day at 11 a.m., you shoot me an email telling me that you’re doing okay or that you’re not and you want to talk at lunch time. And if you want to talk, instead of going to the lunchroom, we’ll seclude ourselves in my office and you can tell me what you’re going through.
Leon: That’s a really generous offer. But would that be asking too much? What if I want to talk every day of the week?
Rory: It’s not too much at all. And I’m going to make you a promise. I’m going to stick with you through this difficult time, as long as it takes.
I remember when I was first getting settled into my post-hope life. It was really hard and I could have used a deal like this. And besides I’ll probably resonate with a lot of what you’re going through, so don’t think this is going to be like therapy where I take care of you. This will just be conversations. I get to talk, too.
Leon: Okay, that helps.
Rory: What else would help?
Leon: I need to be able to turn off my post-hope distress when I go home. Lynnette is totally a hope person and I can see this is too much for her. She works at a nonprofit that’s all about hope. And she’s high on hope. But me, I can’t unsee what I’ve seen about climate change and the future. I’ve crossed a threshold that’s irreversible. But I need to keep it to myself when I’m at home.
Rory: What will that do to your relationship, though, if you’re hiding something this important from her, and she knows you’re hiding?
Leon: Oh, jeez, I don’t have an answer. I would hate it if the loss of hope meant that I would lose Lynnette as well. I can’t let that happen. I just can’t. We’ve been together for ten years now, and they’ve been very, very good years.
Rory: My take on you is that you’re still in the despair phase of losing hope.
Leon: That sounds right except I don’t know what you mean.
Rory: When people lose hope, despair is waiting right there to swallow them up. It often takes a while to learn how to fight for yourself, and to upgrade love, and to find the good part of leaving hope behind, the kind of things you hear us talking about in staff meetings.
Leon: Okay, I can see that you’re all further down the road than I am. Maybe I’m resisting. Maybe I’m too comfortable in my despair. Maybe the fight phase, if that’s what’s next, scares me a bit.
Rory: If so, that would not be unusual. But the thing is, getting into the fight part of the post-hope life makes a person a lot easier to be around, even for people high on hope.
Leon: That sounds promising. And it’s something I could do, something I could have control over. This is a gift I could give Lynnette. To get myself out of the grind of despair. And upgrading love, that sounds like exactly the work I need to be doing now in my relationship.
Rory: Stepping up like this is a gutsy thing to do, but I know you to be a gutsy guy.
Leon: I like to think that I am…and OMG! OMG!
Rory: What?
Leon: I just saw it. What the real problem is. I’ve been so concerned with my own distress I haven’t been paying attention at all to Lynnette’s distress about my distress. I’m usually a very considerate guy, but since my crash last year, I’ve been so damned self-centered. I’ve been slouching on her, depending on her to keep the relationship going. I have no idea how she’s really feeling about living with a guy who’s so down so much of the time.
Oh god, I feel just terrible about this. No wonder my relationship is in trouble.
Rory: Bravo for seeing that and admitting it.
Leon: I don’t feel very bravo. I feel sick.
Rory: So what do you want to do?
Leon: I need to arrange a good chunk of time, not just a few minutes but a few hours, to talk this through with Lynnette, and at a time of her choosing so she’s not distracted by anything else.
Rory: And what will you say to her?
Leon: I have no idea.
Rory: I’d be glad to talk that through with you if you want. Help you prepare yourself for the conversation.
Leon: That would be good. It would be very good. I don’t want to go to Lynnette cold. I’ve been discounting her and that would just be more of the same. I want to really prepare, so much so that she can feel it, and feel how much I care about her.
And I’m freaked right now, and my thoughts are spinning and I can’t go to her like that. So yes, please, let’s work on this together.
Rory: You’ve got it.
Leon: You know, I’m really lucky to work here where I have post-hope comrades. I don’t have to censor myself in the office. Maybe my work hours would be enough post-hope time for me and maybe I could learn when I go home to leave that stuff at work. But then I’d just be giving Lynnette part of myself, and would that hurt our relationship? And are we now on different journeys? Do we have incompatible futures? Oh, I hate this.
Rory: Notice that even though your thoughts are spinning, you’re coming up with ideas. How about if we get together for an hour after work and see if we can lay out a game plan for our conversations? Enough so you can stop spinning and begin to feel anchored.
Leon: An hour would be good, but then I have to get home to Lynnette and apologize like crazy for how I’ve been treating her and tell her I’m working on this.
But now this deal we’re making sounds like it’s all going to be about me. Will that be okay for you?
Rory: Guess what? While you’ve been talking I had a realization myself. Not a happy one. Well, I’m happy I had it, but the realization is not fun.
Leon: Tell me.
Rory: My Rachel calls herself an agnostic when it comes to hope. She’s decided not to decide one way or another about whether we humans are going to make it. She says, “I make the best contribution she can every day and then I can be at peace.” And she really is. And some days I envy her.
Leon: And what’s that mean for your relationship?
Rory: I feel very lucky. Because she doesn’t freak out about my perspective. And we’ve always been easy together. From the day we met, we’ve had similar views and similar interests, and you know what? We’ve never had an out-and-out fight about anything.
Leon: Wow. Sweet.
Rory: It is, but I wonder if I’ve let that mislead me. When you were saying your OMGs, I was having one of my own. Specifically, I’ve been going deeper and deeper into my post-hope work, but I haven’t checked in with Rachel to see what impact that has on her. No for a long time. So I need to have a serious talk with her as soon as possible. But, like you I want to prepare.
Leon: So we could prepare together?
Rory: Yes, brothers in distress.
Leon: Okay, so tomorrow night for an hour after work it’s your turn.
Rory: Suddenly I’m seeing a bigger picture.
Leon: Like this question about mixed-hope relationships is much bigger than just you and me?
Rory: Yes, exactly that.
Leon: Like we could turn our troubles into a program of some kind.
Rory: There’s the activist I know and admire.
Leon: What if we did a bunch of interviews?
Rory: Yes! With people who have successful mixed-hope relationships.
Leon: And people whose relationships broke apart because of differences about hope.
Rory: We’re smart guys, and I know we can come up with good stuff just talking between ourselves, but I like this idea so much better. I like the idea of getting serious about getting help.
Leon: And develop enough expertise that we could give help.
Rory: To couples, and to organizations.
Leon: Organizations?
Rory: Look at us, we’re a post-hope nonprofit, but we work closely with hope-based nonprofits. But we’ve rarely ever asked them what that’s like. Do they struggle with our perspective? Does it ever scare them? Do they keep us at a distance? Could we be closer in our working relationships if we found better ways to talk about the difference between us?
Leon: Very good, very rich questions. Gutsy questions. It’ll take some courage to ask them, but count me in. And I just got an outrageous idea.
Rory: Tell, tell!
Leon: There’s so much we will be learning from turning our struggles into a proactive project, what about inviting Lynnette and Rachel to join us?
Rory: Wow. Do you think they’d want to join in?
Leon: I don’t know. But Lynnette is courageous in the work she does. She might go for it. And especially if I cross over into a fighting mood, if she finds it easier to be around me. And doing research and finding out all the different ways mixed-hope couples handle their relationships could be very good for us, and she might like that.
Rory: And maybe the four of us could run some support groups.
Leon: And learn even more. And working together would bring us closer together.
Rory: And if we’re going to do this, why not go all in? Maybe could write a book.
Leon: Or put together a channel on YouTube.
Rory: Okay, so we’ve got a plan. We’re each going to talk to our partners about our personal relationships, but somewhere in those conversations we can invite them into our project.
Leon: Should we flesh it out first?
Rory: I’m thinking not. If we’re going to invite them in, let’s offer to let them in at the beginning so they can help shape what we do. So they can have a full vote on what gets designed.
Leon: Right, that makes sense, because then they’d be full-on partners instead of tag-alongs. What about Rachel, do you think she’ll sign up?
Rory: I’m going to guess, yes. She’s no shrinking violet. If she finds this interesting, she’s definitely got the courage to engage.
Leon: Okay, we’ve got a plan, indeed. But my heart is in my throat. This is taking my breath away. So I’m going to go back to my office right now and call Lynnette before I start to get cold feet and I’ll tell her I want us to have some time to talk tonight. Strike while the iron is hot, you know. Or the heart is open.
You never outgrow your need for courage
As you develop your inner strengths and your moral core, being bold with people becomes easier and more fun.
It might get to the point where having a forthright conversation…
Feels less like courage and more like you.
Still I think it’s fair, whenever you are having direct conversations, that you get to call them courageous, even if they feel easy. I think it’s fair to honor what you’re doing because it really is something special.
But just because you become masterful in everyday situations, that doesn’t mean you’re done with courage.
If you’re a post-hope, moral-fight activist…
You’re still going to have to find the courage to deal day after day with the death of hope and the death of our species.
You’re going to need courage to oppose tribal fundamentalism, and to do the hard work of building coalitions, so you can help your community at least begin to move in the direction of a trans-tribal transformation.
And you’re going to need to keep mustering your courage as you have intense conversations with people who are freshly crossing over to the far side of hope, landing here scared and disoriented.
The major challenges we post-hope, moral-fight activists are facing are so big that we won’t get beyond the beginning stages in the time we have left. And it takes serious courage to live with that fact, that sorrow.
