Category Archives: leadership

Choose Your Cohorts Wisely

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Who do you want in your boat out at sea?

NaBloPoMo 2021:  Do Good, Kid

Who are or have been the most influential people in your life?  Did you choose them for that purpose, or did they just happen to you?

Looking back on clinical rotations throughout medical school and residency, I still smile or shudder.  We had fun and learned eagerly on my general pediatrics team, when the attending regularly took us outside for teaching rounds.  On another rotation, we missed teaching conferences for hospital rounds all month, and every day was moral drudgery.  The culture, explicit and implicit, of any group, large or small, determines the bulk of the experiences among the people in it.

We do not choose our families of origin, nor our acquaintances of proximity early in life.  In adolescence, forces beyond our comprehension push us in and out of social groups, often at high mental and emotional cost.  If we are lucky, we find and can stick with people who stimulate us, challenge us to think and learn, and help us discover our best selves.  Who did you have growing up who did this for you?

At some point as adults, we need to take responsibility for our social contacts.  If I hang out with people who overeat and overdrink when I really want to lose weight and get healthy, I need to ask myself some important questions. It’s not that they intend to sabotage my efforts at self-care.  They are who they are and do what they do for their own reasons.  But I cannot underestimate their influence on me when I’m with them.  The human need for acceptance and belonging is primal, and manifests primarily in group norms.  No matter our fervent intentions and strong core values, given enough time and exposure, we are all at risk for succumbing to the pressures of conformity.  So when we have an opportunity to select our tribal membership(s), such as for work, it’s better to be clear about what kind of culture we value, and whether our choices align with that standard.

The older I get, the less energy I have to waste. How will I spend this precious resource—my time and attention? What value can I bring to my relationships, and how will they feed me in return? Straight up social reciprocity is a natural human trait, but I’m aiming higher. I want to be my best self and make a meaningful contribution, and I seek others who want the same. Once we find each other and recognize that shared, greater goal—that higher ethos—our mutual return on investment in relationship becomes synergistic and exponential, and benefits more than just ourselves. We are better, together, for society at large.

Focus, goals, and personalities evolve over a lifetime.  Mutually enriching relationships in a previous life phase may wane in significance over time.  Or we may grow closer with age, flourishing in parallel rather than divergence.  I think either is okay, if it’s done with awareness, intention, and grace.  Cultivating meaningful relationships is a lifelong practice in these three skills.  If we find and run with others committed to this lifelong training, then we may all realize the fruits of its mastery–or at least of progress–faster, and hopefully with a little less suffering and a lot more fulfillment.

Judge Judiciously

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NaBloPoMo 2021:  Do Good, Kid

The person who cuts you off in traffic is not (necessarily) an a**hole; nor is the person who voted for the other candidate (necessarily) stupid, evil, or out to destroy the country.  These are judgments we make, knowing nothing else about people, driven too often by a toxic cocktail of negative emotion and prejudice.  I wrote a few days ago about resisting early closure and asking more and better questions, in order to come to better conclusions—to make better judgments.

What good does it do us to judge quickly?  It feels decisive and righteous, for one thing.  It can make our decisions easier and faster when we don’t stop and question our assumptions and biases, or examine the influence of our own emotional baggage.  We get to dwell in the comfortable, if somewhat distorted, status quo of our own worldview, perhaps oblivious to the unintended impact of all that we ignore and dismiss.  This works for a while, maybe.

But we’ve probably all experienced that humbling moment when we realize how a snap judgment led us seriously astray.  What did it cost us?  Perhaps we lost a great job opportunity, or damaged a relationship that we care about.  Did we ruin a negotiation?  Maybe we lost someone’s trust, which we may never fully earn back. 

I’m not saying we should never make judgments.  Decisions must be made, after all.  Hiring, firing, mergers and acquisitions, voting, marriage—all human relationships and collaborations require us to dance, sometimes in elaborate steps of give and take, call and response, and iterative, reciprocal disclosures and choices. I think drawing premature, oversimplified conclusions closes more doors than it opens, especially in our minds.

So when is judgment required and important?  What makes judgment ‘good’?  I think it’s when our core values are at stake and at play.  I witness someone lying because telling the truth is costly or painful.  I know that another person says they believe one thing, and yet their actions speak differently, for whatever reason(s).  Does a given decision before me align with my core values of honesty, integrity, fairness, inclusion, kindness, and generosity?  If not, I can judge the action, and not necessarily the person who makes it, as dishonest, lacking integrity, unfair, exclusionary, unkind, or selfish.  If I make a judgment, I should be willing to defend it with conviction.  In my mind that means employing both evidence and sound reason, not just escalating emotions—unless, of course, I am aware that my judgment comes from exactly the latter.

This is an all too human foible that we would all do well to recognize.  When we see someone judging suddenly and severely, we can ask, ‘What core value, belief, or identity do they feel being violated here?’  This type of judgment can rarely be reasoned away with evidence to its contrary.  Read The Culture Puzzle by Moussa, Newberry, and Urban, Why We’re Polarized by Ezra Klein, and The Power of Us by Van Bavel and Packer, to see how our various strongly held identities trigger intense emotional hijack when we feel them to be threatened.  Under such conditions we slide into tribalist survival mode, aggressively attacking our perceived attacker, elephants loose, operating in fixed rationalization the whole way. 

If we can take a few deep breaths and withhold our own judgment for a moment, exercise some curiosity, empathy, and compassion, and not take their words and attitude personally (especially if they are judging and attacking us), perhaps we could see them as a fellow human, get a glimpse of what really matters to them, and appreciate why they’re so riled up. Maybe we could even learn something new. We can de-escalate. And once we do that, we can render wholly unnecessary our need to judge in return. How liberating.

Smile, Laugh, Hug, Repeat

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NaBloPoMo 2021:  Do Good, Kid

Times are so hard right now.  Tempers are short, nerves are frayed.  We feel edgy, agitated, hypersensitive.  It’s no wonder, with a global pandemic going on two years.  Our work, our kids’ schools, and everybody’s lives are disrupted in more complex ways than we can wrap our heads around. 

And yet, through it all, we persist. For many of us, it’s not been all bad. We slowed down, reassessed, reprioritized, and emerged with a deeper understanding and appreciation for more simple sources of fulfillment in life. If anything, it’s the connections gained from pandemic living that have saved us, and the disconnections that threaten us most.

Even after the acute scourge of COVID, we will still encounter hardships—strains on our patience with one another, acts of nature out of our control, more short tempers and frayed nerves, relationships at risk. How can we fortify ourselves and one another against despair and withdrawal? We can throw ourselves into work, which may hold us up if our jobs are full of meaning. We can numb with food, alcohol, drugs, sex, and other high risk behaviors.

We need something to fan the flames, however small, of hope and optimism—the faith that we will be okay, that we can handle whatever comes, as long as we do it together. I feel so blessed with such amazing people in my life, friends and family alike. Every day I marvel at how I got so lucky. I’m also reminded that I have a hand in these wonderful connections—I cultivate them on purpose. I learned how from my mom, and I see my kids growing in their skills.

To exercise good humor, find joy, and connect with people through that which uplifts—jokes, memes, comedy, and the like—I think we sometimes underestimate the vital importance of these practices in daily life. It’s too easy to get sucked into darkness, to lose the light. But it’s always there, however faint or dim, if we look. We can always find something to smile and laugh about. We can always offer each other a warm embrace (especially if we are vaccinated, masked, and asymptomatic, and even if we are not).

It’s how we share love, and that’s what keeps us going. When we meet people, even if our own mood is sour, we can choose to smile. That one offer of connection can set the path of any encounter on an upward trajectory, lifting all involved. We can share a funny—oh hey look, I wrote about this for NaBloPoMo last year! 😀 Besides The Big Bang Theory and Nathan Pyle, this year I also recommend Awkward Yeti, Upworthy, and any source that offers joy without judgment.

Let’s all hold each other in a little more light, love, fun, and grace, eh? 

In case you have not had your dose today, I just saw this on Facebook now; please enjoy and pass it on:

This starts my 22nd year of teaching middle school. Yesterday was quite possibly one of the most impactful days I have ever had.

I tried a new activity called “The Baggage Activity”. I asked the kids what it meant to have baggage and they mostly said it was hurtful stuff you carry around on your shoulders.

I asked them to write down on a piece of paper what was bothering them, what was heavy on their heart, what was hurting them, etc. No names were to be on a paper. They wadded the paper up, and threw it across the room.

They picked up a piece of paper and took turns reading out loud what their classmate wrote. After a student read a paper, I asked who wrote that, and if they cared to share.

I’m here to tell you, I have never been so moved to tears as what these kids opened up and about and shared with the class.

Things like suicide, parents in prison, drugs in their family, being left by their parents, death, cancer, losing pets (one said their gerbil died cause it was fat, we giggled😁) and on and on.

The kids who read the papers would cry because what they were reading was tough. The person who shared (if they chose to tell us it was them) would cry sometimes too. It was an emotionally draining day, but I firmly believe my kids will judge a little less, love a little more, and forgive a little faster.

This bag hangs by my door to remind them that we all have baggage. We will leave it at the door. As they left I told them, they are not alone, they are loved, and we have each other’s back.

I am honored to be their teacher.

via: Karen Wunderlich Loewe / Facebook

Originally posted in 2019