by tashmcgill | Dec 14, 2014 | Culture & Ideas, Family
This is the second in a series of reflecting on lessons learned. I’m sharing them because I think it’s really important to consider how we learn from those around us. It’s about actively engaging in the learning process, throughout our lifetimes.
I think it’s universal that the relationships between mothers and daughters are complex. I know mine is, but in a good way.
When two women which such high-powered EQ co-exist in a variety of roles over decades, there is simply so much to navigate. The roles of nurture within a home, parenting, then be-friending, supporting, challenging, disciplining and helping create self-awareness – all these roles have become shared in our relationship. I’m grateful for that. I’ve learned a lot about how to love and serve a wide range of women in my life from this relationship with my mother. I’m also lucky to share some aspects of that relationship with my sisters, although no child has the same parenting relationship there is certainly plenty to learn and observe from our shared experiences.
As with Lessons My Father Taught Me, these are my words to describe what I’ve learned from a woman who raised me, teaches me and inspires me still.
- Fix the problem that starts with you.
It used to drive me crazy as a teenager and young adult. Now I try to ask myself the question before I need Mum to – it’s a really powerful question. In any situation or conflict that didn’t go my way or I found myself in some sort of trouble, she would ask, ‘Well, what was your part in it? What did you do to get that reaction?’. It’s possibly the smartest way I started to learn the power of self-awareness, when to think before speaking and when to risk it regardless. It’s an incredibly powerful tool in forgiveness and reconciliation to be able to humbly own your own part in any conflict. There is rarely any shame in being responsible for your own actions, when it comes to making an apology.
- If there’s something you want, there’s always something you can do to get it.
As much as my dad has taught me to always believe and look for hope, it’s my mother that has taught me to always consider what actions you can take to pursue the result you want. She’s an expert problem solver because of that, always looking for action you can take to move you closer to the goal.
- Just tell the truth and then we’ll deal with it.
There’s not much to say about this. Other than, I’ve learned this is most valuable in relationships. Too often, it is in relationship with others that we struggle to be most truthful about what we think, what we feel and how that might affect each of us. So this, is possibly the singular most important thing, because it goes hand in hand with a promise. Just tell the truth (and I will be graceful enough to receive it well) and then we’ll deal with it.
- Let your brain rest on it, great solutions sometimes need time.
I’ve lost count of the number of times I have talked to my mother about a problem or challenge I’m facing, only to have her call me back the next morning or email with a solution I never would have considered. From time to time, she’ll even say – ok, let me think about it and I’ll call you tomorrow. I’ve learned that our capacity to come up with creative solutions is often most effective when we let our instinct and subconscious have a few hours to wrestle with the problem first. Often now, I’ll come back from a meeting with a client and just need to sit and think about the information. It’s digesting time. It’s time for the genius within to do work.
- Creativity, hospitality, traditions and atmosphere welcome people in.
I’m sitting at my mother’s house right now, surrounded with Christmas decorations. This is the first year in a long time we haven’t thrown a traditional Christmas decorating party with our extended family and friends. Mum has a knack for creating environments that people can enjoy, for hosting with enthusiasm and creating traditions that welcome other people into them. I realise that I carry many of these traits from her – annual parties, traditions and creating atmosphere for people to enjoy. I learned from her and I hope to teach my family the same.
- You make your family and then you choose it.
Maybe it’s because we have a small and geographically dispersed family, or growing up in the church but for whatever reason, our extended family counts more friends than blood relatives. But they are close as close can be. Mum has consistently welcomed people into our family life, including our friends as we’ve grown. From that I’ve learned the value of investing in the children of your friends and known the peace that comes from making a family of friends, even as a single person.
- Always look for opportunities to connect people.
Mention the word ‘networking’ and people sometimes visibly shudder. It conjures images of self-serving, rapid business card exchanges and a set of shallow, transactional relationships. I prefer the word ‘connecting’ because that’s what Mum does in her professional life and her work life. She is constantly connecting people to one another for no personal gain, but in a way that enriches others. I’ve learned from her that connecting other people is a rewarding process from which goodness comes.
- Be generous with your time, your love and your money.
There’s a fine line between living a life of true generosity and living a life of obligation. From my mother, I’ve learned to give what you can, when you can. To make choices about generosity wisely is something I’m still learning, however I think the more you connect with giving something away for the sake of someone else and less for yourself, it matters less.
- Be active in your creativity and in your rest, so that you add to the world.
My mum is a maker and a teacher. Of course, that’s not her job. But if you were to ask what my mother does, I would tell you she makes and she teaches. What makes her a good teacher? She offers what she knows without pretence. She shares her knowledge willingly. She makes constantly – whether it’s foodie treats (no one can beat her strawberry jam or tamarillo chutney), quilts, scrapbooks, room renovations – you name it, she is constantly making. She adds to the world. So I try to make, create and rest by adding something to the world.
There’s a way of living which is earnest, good and generous. It’s wholehearted and passionate, a force of nature and I aspire to live in that way too, in the steps of my mother.
by tashmcgill | Dec 13, 2014 | Culture & Ideas, Family
Too often, we wait too long in life to realise the lessons we are learning from our parents and those around us. I’ve been thinking a lot about what I’ve learned from my parents and decided to start sharing it with you. Maybe you’ll share with me what you’ve learned too.
When I was about 9 years old, a teacher came to me after an assembly and said, ‘Your dad is at the back of the room looking for you.’
I shot back quick smart, ‘Oh yeah? You’ve never met my dad, how do you know it’s him?’
Not to be outsmarted by a precocious 9-year-old, she replied, ‘It’s written all over your face, you look just like him.’
To be fair, no 9-year-old girl really wants to hear that she’s the spitting image of a 45-year-old man but I am the spitting image of my father; blue eyes, round cheeks and that same chin.
Although now I can see I have the Godfrey eyes and my mother’s hands, I have always been, in one way or another, ‘just like your dad’.
Recently I’ve got to thinking about the very tangible things that I’ve learned from him. Maybe it’s because my dad has regular health scares or I’ve simply been to a few too many funerals this year – but I’ve been wanting to tell people more and more, where I’ve learned some of the core aspects of who I am. Where I come from.
To be clear – these are my words for what I’ve learned from Dad, not his own. But when I think about everything he is (and isn’t) I stumble across these themes time and time again.
- Relentless optimism.
I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve observed my Dad pick himself back up and continue on. When health has failed or work has been a struggle, he continues on. He’s always finding new opportunities and things to push forward into. He’s taught me to look for opportunities at every turn. To believe that things can turn around on a dime or on a long slow bend – and that there is always hope.
- Believe in yourself, even when no one else does or should.
There are no shortage of people who believe that will believe in you to a degree, but there will be times when the amount of belief you need is beyond what anyone else can give you. Whether it’s been pushing a creative idea beyond the limits of approvals or being too broke for gas when trying to crack a new deal open, my dad has taught me the power of remembering just how good you can be. There is one incident I remember with such clarity it brings tears to my eyes even now – Dad’s words were simple and to the point. ‘Tash, look at your little finger. You’ve got more creativity in that little finger than the rest of us put together – now you just need to remember that, ok?’
- Whenever you can, make somebody laugh.
I used to groan when Dad would make jokes with the checkout lady at the supermarket, although secretly I’d always be impressed when he could make them smile. I’ve learned that it’s a gift to bring a little light into someone’s world whenever you can. Dad’s taught me that you can’t be too serious all the time or you’ll get out of balance. And that sometimes when things really are pretty serious, you need a good laugh more than you think. That humour can get pretty dark, but I got that from him too, I think. I’ll never forget the first time he talked seriously about getting a tattoo (after my sister and I both had them) – his suggestion was a zipper over his bypass scar, with a tag saying ‘in case of emergencies, open here’. I used to be too serious about everything and now I probably err on the other side, but I think Dad’s side is better in this instance. It’s better to laugh and carry on than to miss the chances to smile with people.
- Everybody is a potential friend.
To be fair, I learned from both my parents to welcome people with open arms, but hospitality is still a little different from making friends wherever you go. I’ve never seen Dad turn up his nose at. I think I become friends with bartenders because my dad has always been friends with the people who served him, from the local pizzeria to the mechanic or the wine merchant. He’s never polite for the sake of being polite or friendly, he’ll back it up almost every time. It’s genuine.
- Don’t blink in the face of the unexpected – don’t ever judge.
I only recently learned from Dad that he used to consider himself a bit of a homophobe. I’m sure he won’t mind me sharing that as he’s long since changed his mind – as usual, he met someone who he welcomed into his life and couldn’t help but learn to love a gay man as a dear friend. When Bruno eventually passed from illness, it was easy to see the impact it had on him. Here’s the thing: I never knew that. Dad doesn’t blink in the face of the unexpected, he just takes it in his stride. There’s not much that can faze me these days and I think I learned that from him too.
- Humiliation is disempowering to you and others.
There have been plenty of opportunities where my dad could have read the ‘I told you so’ script to me on repeat, throwing old and new failures in front of me. Not because he’s cruel but just because that’s how some people are. But Dad has never taken an opportunity to do that, even when I’m sure he’s wanted to. And when I’ve faced humiliating experiences, he’s never dwelt in them – rather he’s helped me pick up and carry on. He’s helped brush over those humiliations to preserve my dignity in front of others.
- If you have to do something tough and you feel bad, it’s probably the right thing for the right reasons.
This was a much more direct and recent lesson. I was sharing some struggles I was having in communicating some pretty serious implications to a colleague. I was feeling awful about the process although I knew I needed to follow it through. Dad said, ‘someone once told me that when you have to do something tough, or say something tough to another person and you feel bad about it – it’s probably the right thing. And it’s a good thing that you feel bad about it, because it means you do really care about the person.’ Changed my whole week and the course of my relationship with that colleague.
What’s important about these lessons? Well, they have become part of the fabric of how I do life. They are criteria for my humanity – my Dad is very human.
I’m not as good a daughter these days as I used to be. Still, I want people to know that when they see me at work or at life, my father and all I’ve learned from him is an integral part of me. It’s good to remember where I came from and to share what I’ve learned from him because I think they are good lessons for all of us.
There’s something redemptive about recognising the gifts our parents and mentors bring us from their own experience, good or bad.
by tashmcgill | Dec 9, 2014 | Community, Leadership, Spirituality
It’s rare that I would choose to comment on current news in this forum. But I will today, because the last 48 hours or so have been truly abhorrent. When my friend David Hayward posted a supportive Facebook comment regarding Jim Marjoram this evening, it confirmed my conviction that this is worth taking a stance on. The reason why I’m writing about this? I’ve seen many pastors and friends post Facebook updates of sympathy, compassion and outrage but not address some of the underlying issues with the occurences of the last few days. But the most unreasonable thing has gone unnoticed, without comment from so many. Of 400 opportunities, only 1 voice responded and was heard. That voice was an embarrassment, a reminder of a broken humanity. Why so silent, 399? Why so quient? It’s easy to be outraged when somebody says something nonsensical, but the other, more justifiable atrocity is right under our noses and nobody has said a thing.
Here’s the short version of what’s happened to date:
- Jim Marjoram is a courageous man, trying to walk a reconciled life between his sexuality and a fundamental religion that would often rather not deal with him
- He wrote a book, called ‘It’s Life, Jim’
- His story deserves honour and attention
- He emailed details of the book to about 400 churches in NZ
- He got one response, that I won’t repeat here
- His courage and bravery should never have been treated with such disdain
- It’s a tragedy that this was the only response received from the broader Christian community
- This is absolutely not the ideal marketing solution
There are many Christians and people of faith who have been outraged in recent days by the words and actions of the self-proclaimed pastor of a church called Westcity Bible Baptist Church in Auckland, New Zealand. You can read more from media outlets about the story here and here.
Update: One of the most important points I want to make is that there is a lack of strategy in how this email came out, which means that the Church needs to think carefully and well about how to respond, so that the current voice is not the only voice heard. A number of Christian leaders have responded to Jim personally, as well as reaching out to Logan Robertson. Bravo. The Baptist Church of New Zealand has made an official statement – which I commend.
Here’s the summary. Jim is gay and Christian. He’s been both activist and grace demonstrator over the years that I have known of him, his activities and his relationships with many that I respect and love. He recently published a book that ought to be embraced with open arms by the mainstream Church – his story of being both gay and Christian. You can purchase it here and you should, because these stories are important and should be honoured. His story is one of trying to find reconciliation between sexuality and spirituality, two aspects of humanity that should rarely be separated.
Jim sent an email promoting the book to churches in New Zealand to support the release. He received one response: an independent, fundamentalist pastor who stated his desire that the author would commit suicide. When interviewed by news media, Pastor Logan Robertson reported that although not something he would want to do, he believed the Government should put homosexuals to death.
Not affiliated with the Baptist Union of New Zealand (an organisation with which I have been and remain an advocate); this person has managed to unveil a number of crucial lessons that all reasonable human beings ought to consider.
Here’s the frustration for me.
Lesson #1. For the Church – Did No One Pay Attention?
Are you freaking kidding me that this was the only response Jim received? 400 churches on the email list and no one had the presence of mind, the compassion or even the good conscience to reply to his email? Granted, I can’t speak for the elapsed time between when the email was sent and the ‘nil reply’ measure given, nor the quality of the list (I’ll come back to that) – but when the voice of Christianity is left in the hands of the minority, there is little ground to stand on for people to be horrified. I am deeply appalled that at a time when we ought to be able to embrace these stories with grace, compassion and interest – it appears there was no room at the inn for Jim’s story. A crushing blow, in the Advent season. There is no blame to be placed at the feet of the media for giving attention to the story, the worst part is that Logan Robertson’s voice was the only one to respond. In defence; many pastors receive hundreds of emails a week promoting a variety of Christian books, products and services. It’s very probable that many did not read the email. This does relate to the next point, regarding strategy.
Lesson #2. For Marketers – Did No One Check The List?
This will be highly impolitic to say, however, this appears to be appalling marketing practice. If a blanket email inbox dump is your best strategy, then it comes as no surprise that a unvetted, unchecked email list created such controversy. There’s a lesson in this for all would-be and professional marketers – when you’re dealing with a bespoke and important message, you better have a clear idea about who and where you’re sending that message. I wish that I’d had the chance to work with Jim on the strategy around the book release, because common sense rationalises the risk of sending unsolicited direct email to anybody, let alone regarding a topic bound to send chills down the spine of an Independent Baptist. Sound direct marketing and email marketing principles exist for a reason as aptly demonstrated by the complete mismatch of audience and message here. Whilst this might seem like trivialization, it’s really not because people are guilty of this kind of negligence every day. Regardless of what minor side benefit might be gained from the publicity in current form, the message of the book is now tainted with an altogether different message.
Lesson #3. For Activists – Don’t Stop Being Brave.
Realistically speaking, there is every chance that Jim’s book and his story may have largely passed under the radar of the average New Zealand Christian or the average New Zealand gay person. I’m really glad that this story made a way to the front page news because it matters that we stop tolerating this. I’m relieved to hear and see other Christian leaders publicly admonishing this young man because it matters so much, that the rest of NZ society understands we don’t share a single view on this. I’m also sad for Logan, because this kind of public statement is extraordinarily hard to recover from with an equal sense of public humiliation. We need people like Jim and others I know, who are brave enough to take these first steps to say publicly, ‘I will be both gay and Christian’, in order to educate, prove and disprove the lingering questions that may exist. That is activism – to prove something with your own life.
A Challenge In Conclusion
Believe what you will about sexuality and it’s expression alongside spirituality. My stand is simple. If you are remotely sympathetic to the Christian faith and you haven’t worked out which side of this story you would choose to stand on, you’ve got some stuff to work out. I’ll happily have those conversations with you – but there is no space in any kind of Gospel story or values I know that has room for the bigotry and hatred demonstrated in this man’s words over the last few days.
If you are a Christian, particularly if you are a leader in a Christian community – I challenge you to do more than simply express your sympathy or your shame in a Facebook post or a tweet. Engage your people in the conversation about restoring grace and humanity to those whose spirituality has been somehow overshadowed by their sexuality. Do more than give words.
Lastly; if you or someone you know is experiencing a sense of displacement or confusion in their faith or relationship with faith communities – may I recommend thelastsupper.com to you? You’ll find a community of people who are welcoming, vulnerable and honest. You’ll also find a leader and pastor in David, who is compassionate and remarkable.
by tashmcgill | Dec 8, 2014 | Culture & Ideas, Family, Youth Work
As a youthworker, I’m in a position to see a pattern emerging over the last 15 years. It’s more prevalent now than it was when I started working with young people and their families and by my observation, it’s a bit of a Trojan horse. It’s the desire to be ‘cool’ in the eyes of their kids, the need to be cool in every part of a child’s life. It looks and sounds great, but can be the cause of more heartache and trouble than you intend.
Advice For Right Now.
If your child is under the age of 21, don’t try and be their friend. Not yet. You have a job to do and they need you to do it. The study of adolescence would tell us that our young people are potentially still developing physically, emotionally and intellectually until they are 25 years of age. During that time of emerging identity, self-awareness and critical formation in the areas of sexuality, spirituality, vocation and passions – your children need you to take the role that can only be filled by one or two. The role of parent.
Friends vs Parents/Trusted Adults
Over their lifetimes, your kids are going to make a lot of friends. They’ll lose some, keep some for life. Probably make poor choices about a couple and they’ll make some of their best memories with friends. Friends are, the family you choose. But it’s precisely because you choose your friends (and the older you get the more time you spend choosing, or the more choosy you get), that a distinction applies. In choosing your friends, you’re never obligated to choose the ones that rub up against your rough edges but make you a better human on the way.
Friendship is often equally paired and transactional, there’s a mutual exchange of esteem and confidence boosting. Take away the esteem boosting and the value of the friendship fades. For starters, a parent’s relationship with a child should never be transactional. “You give me this, I’ll give you that.” It’s the core of dysfunction between a parent and child. Starting down this path is the opposite of building mutual respect.
Friends give bad advice from time to time.
Ultimately friends have less investment and often less meaningful context. During periods of potential instability, if you can build a foundation of reliable, secure advice with your young person – whether they take your advice or even like, won’t be able to refute the quality of the advice they are receiving. The offering of wisdom and the application of it are two very different things.
Few friendships ever fall of the sword of the greater good. In other words, your children need to have a steady and reliable person/s that will look out for their greater good during hardship and upheaval.
Friends don’t necessarily have the same values at a time when values are an important part of identity exploration. Having people in the life of a young person who can safely give permission to explore different applications of values and challenges to the status quo is vital, but those people are often not peers. Peers have equally limited experience and little alternative insight to offer into the process. Having people with similar values to process and discuss alternate possibilities with is strengthening.
Friends don’t always sharpen iron these days. In adolescent friendship, commonality is often the lynchpin of otherwise fragile emotional connections. Thus, iron sharpening iron isn’t a practice commonly found until early adulthood or when identity is more fully formed.
So what’s the role of a parent anyway?
I was visiting with a friend the other day and watched her young tween daughter lash her with drippings of adolescent behaviour – pushing boundaries to see how far she could go, sassing up the room with a mix of childlike comedy (quite enchanting) and whiny brat (less so). I watched my darling friend take a beating from her kid. It’s not intentional, but it’s nearly impossible to avoid the trap of our children influencing our self-esteem, but it’s ten-fold if we let ourselves get into the role of friend rather than parent. It’s natural to want to be liked by your kids, but it’s healthier to accept that how much they like you isn’t a good measure of how well you are parenting.
Children and especially adolescents desperately need parents who can provide companionship and wisdom along the journey, but in the unique and gifted role of Trusted Advisor.
Too often, parents want to avoid the stereotypical roles of Taskmaster, Bossy Bitch, Nagger, RuleMaker. Fair enough, they are not easy titles. But if you can push through the pain and pride-pinching accusations, there are alternate ways of looking at those roles.
Imagine being the parent who’s child never had a reason to doubt or question their advice. Who had been invited into the learning process alongside their parents? Who had positive frameworks for discussing conflict, disagreement and the establishment of their own, individual values. Most of the time, it’s not until much later stages of life that peer adults are capable of forming such competent bonds; yet these bonds and interactions are key for the development of healthy, well-adjusted and well-rounded young adults.
That’s why it’s so critical that parents accept the challenge of Not-Yet-Friends with their children and adolescents.
Friendship with your children is the privilege and honour bestowed on those who survive well, the teenage onslaught and adventure ride. It sounds crazy, but it’s true. As with a number of things, decisions that were yours as a parent of a toddler, become the decisions of the young adult themselves. Friendship with you and the nature of it will largely be their choice by the time they hit their mid-20s.
Like it or not, the level of friendship and trust they establish with you in that phase of life will be proportionately based on what they learned from the most recent phase of life and interaction with you.
Pursue parenting then, because it’s in parenting that you become a trusted advisor. It’s in your investment and commitment to them, you can demonstrate wisdom, perseverance, forgiveness and grace. It’s in your interactions and conversations that transcend a mere exchange of esteem building moments that you invest in the concrete foundation of the Parent-Child-Friends relationship.
As youthworkers, encourage parents to parent and not to try to be friends with their young people ahead of time. There’s a season and you shouldn’t rush it.
There are a few myths that need to be put to bed.
‘If I’m cool and can handle anything, then my child will tell me everything and I can be a better parent.’ Nope. You will never be cool enough that your child will tell you everything and why is your esteem wrapped up in it. It’s only building trust and a communicative culture with your child that opens the doors to communication.
‘It’s better to let some things slide and not say what I think, than to lose relationship with my kid.’ Strictly playing devil’s advocate here, but how will demonstrating holding back true honest feedback in your relationship with your teenager possibly help them learn how to be honest and true to themselves? If you want to teach your kids to deal with conflict well, you might as well start with the conflict you have with them.
‘I don’t really like the influence of that friend, but it’s not really my place to say.’ See above. There are limited opportunities to teach and demonstrate how hard but how important it is to offer truthful and graceful feedback to the ones we love. Talk honestly.
‘If I do what my parents did, I’ll turn out just like them and my child will have the scars I have.’No parents are perfect. It doesn’t matter if your kids are angels, scalliwags, 12 months old or 17 year old pop stars. There are no perfect kids, there are no perfect parents. Each child will carry both good and bad experiences from childhood, but learning constructive and positive communication will ensure that both build strength, resilience and character. Your children are not on a repeat cycle, unless you don’t engage in the process. They’re not perfect, neither are you, no one is. Therefore, there is freedom and grace to make mistakes.
In closing, my conversation with my friend was to encourage her to stand her ground. Friends don’t always speak in the nicest manner to each other, especially not when they are entering the teenaged years. I reminded her, implored her to take the higher ground and remember that she is the parent, she does have more experience, more wisdom and more intelligence than her tween daughter. That may not always be the case, but for right now, it is absolutely true. Therefore, there are many things in the day to day that require reframing. The simple recollection that there is a window where adults and children are not all equal. Equal rights, yes, equal concern yes. But equal footing – not.
Parents, enjoy the privilege you have to parent and don’t forgo it too quickly for the sake of friendship. It might sound and feel cooler momentarily, but it cannot deliver the same rewards as being the most trusted and faithful advisor of a young person.
by tashmcgill | Dec 8, 2014 | Leadership, Mind, Strategy
There are three stumbling blocks that prevent me hitting the publish button or sometimes even picking up the pen, metaphorical or otherwise.
They are three questions.
Can I do this well enough and will it be good enough?
Can I make it and let it go out into the world?
Can I show this much of myself to the world, will anybody care?
These are questions designed to help me avoid risk. Which is stupid, because if I want to be in the business of ‘making’, then I want to be in the business of risking myself in vulnerable ways. I know that it’s stupid, so I thought I’d share my strategy for avoiding the trap.
There will always have to be bad writers, for they answer to the taste of the immature, undeveloped age-group; these have their requirements as well as do the mature. —-Nietzche
I hate the idea of not being good at what I do. Regardless of what I’m doing. My pride does cartwheels in the tension of doing something new without knowing whether it will be good. Logically, I understand that in order to be good, I must risk being other-than-good; but every time I open the page to write or try a new recipe, the process begins again.
Why is it sometimes hard to write? Because the risk is so great that it won’t be any good. That it will be too honest, too vulnerable. That people won’t engage or respond or understand me. So the questions run through my mind and my desire to avoid risk stops me in my tracks.
The better way to answer these questions is in editing, refining, fine tuning and optimizing. In my business, it’s called the process of iteration. We make something, we learn, we craft, we make it better. We make it again.
Will it be good enough? becomes How can it be better?
The other questions are not about the creation but about the creator. Ouch. Even in talking about vulnerability I have to be vulnerable.
I find myself wondering how those flawed and tuneless auditions for TV singing competitions make it to air – with all that bravado and self-confidence. It appears that there is no pride or ego to filter the risky and non-risky behaviours.
I’m learning that if I want to be truly vulnerable (and I do, because it seems to matter and connect more with people), I have to de-tune my ego too. I have to put away my pride and concern.
The easiest way I have learned to do this is by facing the consequences of risking something big. Really, in being more vulnerable than I want to be, I’ve learned that it is really not so bad. There’s not a single moment that I truly regret. A few painful bumps, for sure, but that’s to be expected as the rough edges are smoothed away.
It might sound a little mad, but truly – in being a little braver, in saying a little more, in choosing not to edit away the thought, the moment, the possibility.. I’ve learned that it’s rarely as bad as I thought. Mostly, I’m afraid of feeling hurt, feeling bad or feeling ashamed or embarrassed when my ego starts talking.
These ego-driven, risk-averse questions stop me from starting. Starting is the step that produces raw product that can be shaped, redrawn, remade, improved until it’s ready for the world. I can only be a writer, a maker, a speaker or a creator if I begin.
Here’s the strategy to overcome the questions:
Accept that the risk does not exist.
Until you make something, there is nothing that risk can be attached to. Once something is made and re-made, it is no longer dependant on you. It may carry the reflection of the maker, but it is a separate entity. So the risk (to your ego) does not exist.
So just make something, damn it. The risk is the art itself, the risk is the proof that you are creating something unique and authentic.
Read more about Makers here.
