I think you forget …
Where we’ve been.
Listening: A love letter
There is something very painful in this. Not the story you are telling, it helps to hear you share the events of the day. Thank you.
It is not the crumminess of those around you not giving you the chance to do the thing you are best at, getting the thing you want, emailing you back, meeting the deadline that was clearly set. They sure are lousy. They deserve all the blame. You are wronged, confused, or bored and I agree. It is all those things. It is tricky and just one more ‘maybe’ from being a better scenario or giving us enough information to know it is no longer worth bothering trying for.
I am totally with you in all of this and super happy to sit here and tilt my head and take it in.
No, not happy: I am honored. Sure, I’ll do my good bit of talking too. In time, as inclined, as we do, but in all of that, there is something I will never share: it hurts, and I don't know how to tell you about it.
However, I am inspired to go for it. Either it seems a challenge to try to explain the agony or it is just too much at the point not to, and in doing that I get that this is maybe a mistake, but who cares about mistakes anyway?
You see, we’ve spent a lot of time here, in meeting up and getting into ‘it’ and though intellectually we acknowledge that in all that history, as well as the future we have yet to meet, there has been progress. Monstrous and incremental, on projects and in skills, and too, in overarching, but something remains - the lexicon. It is not just a ‘you’ thing, nor a ‘me’ thing, I think, unlike the blame we can place (rightfully!) upon bosses and politicians, the lovers and friends who are not as friendly or loving as they ought to be, rather it is the limitations of language and the horrors of habit.
What am I getting at?
Oh goodness, all right, I will be brave and blunt and say it: How we both talk about you.
You might say:
● I always…
● This happens…
● I hate when I…
● Again…
Conversely, I might say:
● You tend to…
● Why not…
● This reminds me of…
● Why would you think that?
All these are fine. There is nothing wrong, right? Like what am I talking about? What I am talking about is not IN the language but what I know we both are NOT considering when we use the above historical harkening and pattern provoking words - growth.
As vital as it is to look at how and where and what we return to and tend to do behaviorally and in our emotional approaches, there is also a risk, and the risk is forgetting, and it bites.
Growth has a weight. Growth offers a lift. Growth is kind of like the periodic table that even when you have memorized it, you must remember that you remember it. Think about the history and the present in one fist and think of words of verbal associations that do not allow for the ‘where we have been’ in the other.
You may always do this, and this may seem to happen a lot or all the time, but what about the before time? How can we refer to patterns and regular occurrences and practices while holding all the coins of personal wisdom we have accrued? How can we say the words of noticing while also maintaining the justice of progress? How can the embarrassment or frustration with a bothersome present be redeemed by recollecting what was and where we were?
Likely you will find this to be not so sophisticated BUT … I will keep reminding you. I will keep reminding you. I also might get angry. I might explode a bit. I might wiggle my hands, make a face, and stomp my feet a bit and do whatever I can, from here in my Zoom screen, to remind you that you have been “there” and now are “here”. In a world where things are far from linear, there is something about progress and growth that we can approach as if it - yes, yes, the “was” and the “is” as being a “working on it” and “much improved” comparatively.
This is how I get hurt. I allow myself to be. I invite it. To construct an armor through which I do not notice our mutual inclination for neglecting a history of personal and professional betterment we have witnessed together would be a kind of coaching sin. This approach can be super annoying, but just as a loved one might approach breaking your nerves reminding you to “look both ways” when crossing traffic, you are more than welcome to roll your eyes as I say:
“Wait. Stop. Can we think about ….” six weeks or days or moments ago when we …. / I…. / you…” so we continue to and continue to contextualize the entirety of everything we do, and are, together.
Earlier I spoke of blame. (I like to talk about blame due to its humanness, and how inescapable it is.) There is no blame in this for you. Oh HELL no. I certainly blame me when I drop the context ball, that is me sleeping on the job! You being in the present moment of the present experience, having it hold all your brain all at once is a lot. No one can do that continually - that is my job. I am here to bring you ABOVE the box to gaze upon the entire landscape, universe, upon all the factors in place and the person you were and are.
Keep on hurting me in this way. Keep up smiling as I call us out. I am here to handle it - l love it! And soon enough you will get this recollection urge too. And you will tell ME, and we will both smile and laugh and think “DAMN” what a lot of wisdom and courage you have!
