Crunch Time

Become who you really are

There was an unemployed man looking for work. He found an opening at a zoo that was looking for someone to dress in a gorilla costume and sit in a cage. The real gorilla, the star attraction, had passed away and they didn't want to let the visitors know.

He figured he could that. He applied, got the job, and began to sit in the cage in the gorilla costume. He got bored so he began to jump around and act "gorilla like". He found out that the more animated he became with the gorilla moves, the more elated the audience became. He was intoxicated with the accolades, so he thought he would really work the crowd.

He began swinging on a vine, and on his third pass he slipped and flew right into the lion's cage. He realized he was in grave danger so he began to tell the audience that he really wasn't a gorilla, he was only dressing up in a costume and they needed to get help.

Before he could get the message completely out, the lion pounced on the man, pinned him to the ground and said, "Would you shut up! Do you want to get us both found out?!"

Most people spend the first half of their lives being what others expect them to be. They then spend the second half of their lives being what they were made for in the first place. But why wait til then to to become an authentic person? Becoming who you really are requires some bold moves.

First you must get out of your costume. Undress yourself from market definitions of who you are supposed to be. Become unbranded from product lines and become your own brand. Do the hard work of discerning what expectations from others are accurate and which are unreasonable. I think your gut knows the difference. This will make you a new person.

Then become free from your cage. If ignorance is bliss, then we have alot of contented people in the world. Don't believe everything you read or hear. Take the time to think and determine where you are being locked in by biases (yours and others), past disappointments and other restrictive components of life. Change and healing begins with you. Often our cages are locked from the inside.

Finally, venture out into the wild. The philosopher David Henry Thoreau said that the "mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." Often what is called resignation is in reality desperation. Out into the wild is really a part of the life you live now. To be out of your costumes and free from your cages opens a whole new adventure for the life you are already living. Doing this will give you a whole new purpose.

Welcome to the in-between world

It’s important to recognize where we are.  This is brand new stretch of water.  It’s Crunch Time, a disorienting moment of change rife with such extraordinary potentiality that people are faced with the transformative decision on how to get through it. Professor Walter Brueggemann writes that there are three major stages of orientation that reflect even the seasons of our own lives.

The first stage is being “securely oriented”. It is here that we feel settled and secure. Our lives make sense and the decisions we make are anchored in good judgement. This could be a time when your job seems secure and your family life is well ordered. Financially we are doing okay. Yet we know that this security never hangs around for long. Which leads us to the second stage.

The second stage is being “painfully disoriented”. These are times when we feel blind sided, hurt, and reeling from stress and the perceived enormity of change. Here you may have lost a job, a child, a divorce or some other chaotic and unexpected event. Yet if we persist in this movement, hang on with resilience, the third stage inevitable reveals itself.

This third stage is “surprising reorientated”. This stage is marked by surprise, the way things all seemed to work out for good and gives us something new out of something old. When we are in this stage, life seems renewed and our circumstances are compellingly welcomed. Over time this new place becomes settled and secure and we begin the process of moving through the stages all over again.

Right now we are in a stage of painful disorientation. We suddenly find ourselves in a tough new work and life environment.  We have drifted out of the current of a known world and into the vortex of a completely strange, new world. It's in-between what was and what will be. It will be surprising to see where this all leads us.

Made for the struggle

We were made for the struggle. The human race has shown an amazing ability to be resilient in tough times- we all wouldn’t be here otherwise. Exposure to struggle, setbacks, and adversity can steel us to function better than expected with future challenges. It is similar to an inoculation that gives us the strength to resist future exposure to a disease.

Often the deepest joy comes from going through crisis and growing into a stronger, more vibrant person. Meaninglessness in life comes not from having too much pain, but from having too much pleasure. As much as we might not want it, inevitable adversity leads to a depth of meaning that can be garnered no other way.

Becoming a stronger person because of adversity and setbacks is one of the deeper satisfactions in life. However, in order to thrive in the midst of them, we must make a choice. As was previously mentioned, you can either choose to let the situation shackle you with weakness and insecurity or you can choose to lean forward into the headwinds of the storm and find the strength to walk on through.

Choice is the choice to give up choices. When confronted with a difficult situation you must make the choice to give up the choice to give in. It must not even be an option in your mind. You must have a whole hearted resolve to face the difficulty full on and accept the pain that comes along with it. It’s tough though. And there’s the kicker. The weaker response of giving in to adversity is the easier way. That’s why so many people wallow through life. Giving up rather than getting up is a cowardly response that doesn’t take much effort. It’s also surrendering to self-pity and inactivity- the enemies of resolve.

Getting up from tough times takes courage and strength. Its a battle, and a tough one at that. It’s the wounds of that battle that leads to wisdom. I call it “scar tissue”. People who have scar tissue healed by resilience are the wisest, most vibrant of people I know. They become the sages that people seek out for insight on their own quest to thrive.  So, be strong rather than weak, spunky rather than dull, and feisty rather than flaccid.

Feminine napkins and me

My wife and I have three children.  My son is fourteen and my two daughters are twelve and ten.  Though change is constant and swift for them (and us) in the fertile ground of adolescence, there is one change that is hitting me hard in the stomach - and it involves the feminine napkin.

I know what they are and what they're used for.  Heck, I sometimes find them in my gym bag enmeshed with my workout clothes from the wash.  Generally, I don't give them much thought.  Until now. 

When my wife sprung the box of feminine napkins on me one evening, she was preparing me for the inevitable and imminent use of those "things" by my little girl.  My little girl having a period! It was more like an exclamation point. I somehow never imagined her ever needing and using them.  What was I thinking?

I'll tell you. She's my little girl; my snuggler at night, and reading companion by day.  She's the little girl that sits on my lap and kisses me on the cheek.  She's the little girl whose little bottom I wiped clean and dressed with a diaper.  She's the little girl that scibbled love notes with crayons to me on a regular basis. She's the little girl that stole my heart.

Those feminine napkins seemed like thieves.  I saw them as conniving to steal my little girl from me. They were repulsive to my sensibilities.

I was in avoidance mood.  But as is the case, I had to be a big boy and embrace those napkins for what they symbolize - vibrant life and progression into a future that cannot be halted. Her life is vibrant. Always has been, always will be.  Our life together is vibrant. Always has been, always will be.  Feminine napkins will be around.  Always have been, always will be.

Peepholes

It's snowing and cold today where I live.  These conditions create a stubborn glaze of ice on the cars parked outside. The sounds of frantic scrapping on the windshields ricochet through the neighborhood.

In our haste to get on our way, we tend to clear a peephole through the ice just large enough to see ahead.  Yet, such a strategy is dangerous.  It limits our field of vision and diminishes our capacity for strategic response. It's a quick fix with potentially devastating results.

Today's hyper accelerated, disconnected world can quickly ice our souls.  Yet we tend to navigate through it with only a peephole of vision.  As a result, we steer our way through contemporary life with a limited perspective, a diminished response, and a deflated spirit.  A more expansive sight line is needed to keep our souls thawed and our lives expansive.

Have you ever had a conversation that went far deeper than the words spoken or an experience where you felt you had participated in something sacred–that you had been part of the unbidden activity of a reality much more expansive than yourself?  If so, you are experiencing life beyond the peephole.

One of the more significant resources I found to scrape ice from my soul and broaden my vision is the book "God hides in plain sight: How to see the sacred in a chaotic world" by Dean Nelson.  In this colorful, story-driven introduction to sacramental living, Nelson offers human beings a way to see the presence of God amid the chaos and acceleration of every day life.

An expansive life beyond the peephole.  That's the way to go!

Living with ambiguity

Ask yourself this question:

"Is your life out of control?"

Well, if it isn’t, it ought to be...


Social scientist have done extensive research on the human response to ambiguity and uncertainty in our lives.  They have discovered that one our defense mechanisms for protecting against the fear of chaos is the illusion of control.


Control is merely an illusion.  But we persist in living by it everyday.


Think of the simple act of activating an elevator.  We pushed the button and wait for its arrival.  But what we do if it doesn’t arrive in our perceived time frame? We press the button again.  The illusion of control.


We often attempt to control traffic jams.  If you’re like me, I play traffic jams like chess matches.  I strategize moves and counter moves in an attempt to beat the jam and foil it’s traps.
But alas, I find myself usually more irritated and late as usual.  The illusion of control.


But we persist in guiding our lives by its illusion.


We can’t help ourselves.  We are good modern, Western, scientific people and we prefer to be in control - but it is in reality a mirage that fails to provide the needed resources for our journey.  Particularly in crunch time.


A characteristic of the crunch time change we find ourselves in at the moment is Ambiguity.  It is uncertain and disconcerting.  We don’t know precisely where we are headed and we have no control as to how to get there.


So we need to relax during crunch time.  Let go of control.  Embrace uncertainty.  Gather some dear friends, drink some good wine, and laugh at your predicaments.  As the great American philosopher Jimmy Buffett once intoned:

“If we all couldn’t laugh, we would all go insane”

The bittersweet, exhilarating, agonizing angst of change - daddy style

I am father.  I have three children, a son (14), and two daughters (12 &10).  They are growing up way too fast. Way. It's a reality of our perception that time really does "fly". From the overarching umbrella of our swift lifespan to the smaller moments underneath, time flies.

My grandmother passed away last week at the age of 90.  She always referred to the accelerated passage of time. As I age, I too am increasingly aware of that fact.

It's a bittersweet, exhilarating, agonizing angst. Change is inevitable and it takes courage to move through it wisely and with meaning. It requires persistent adaptation. For every wave of goodbye to a one moment is an inevitable hello to another (whether we like it or not).  My grandmother lived from moment to moment in the brief narrative of her life, each passing a bittersweet, exhilarating, agonizing angst - up until her final passage.

From the peculiar perspective of a father I am smack dab in the middle of this bittersweet turmoil. My son started high school this year.  He was home-schooled from sixth to eight grade.  I always joked that I was his junior high buddy then.  My wife could vouched for the often "immature" moments we shared together. Those days are gone...or at least transformed into something uncertain and new.

My daughters still have a bit of time in our home, as they grow up and learn.  But dang it, it's going fast. My youngest always wants a princess kiss, like in the movies, every night before she goes to bed. I'm going to indulge that desire as long as I can, because change happens swiftly and you just never know. I was recently introduced to a song by Steven Curtis Chapman entitled, "Cinderella". He lost his 5 year old  daughter Maria Chapman in a tragic accident in the family’s driveway.

I've included it here along with the lyrics at the bottom. It reminds me of the song "Cat's in the Cradle" (a real "angster" if you have sons) by Harry Chapin. If you're a father and you have young children (particularly daughters), I dare you to listen to it and not be overwhelmed with the angst...

Lyrics::
She spins and she sways
To whatever song plays
Without a care in the world
And I'm sitting here wearing
The weight of the world on my shoulders

It's been a long day
And there's still work to do
She's pulling at me
Saying "Dad, I need you

There's a ball at the castle
And I've been invited
And I need to practice my dancing
Oh, please, Daddy, please?"

So I will dance with Cinderella
While she is here in my arms
'Cause I know something the prince never knew
Oh, I will dance with Cinderella
I don't want to miss even one song
'Cause all too soon the clock will strike midnight
And she'll be gone...

She says he's a nice guy and I'd be impressed
She wants to know if I approve of the dress
She says, "Dad, the prom is just one week away
And I need to practice my dancing
Oh, please, Daddy, please?"

So I will dance with Cinderella
While she is here in my arms
'Cause I know something the prince never knew
Oh, I will dance with Cinderella
I don't want to miss even one song
'Cause all too soon the clock will strike midnight
And she'll be gone

She will be gone

Well, she came home today with a ring on her hand
Just glowing and telling us all they had planned
She says, "Dad, the wedding's still six months away
But I need to practice my dancing
Oh, please, Daddy, please?"

So I will dance with Cinderella
While she is here in my arms
'Cause I know something the prince never knew
Oh, I will dance with Cinderella
I don't want to miss even one song
'Cause all too soon the clock will strike midnight
And she'll be gone

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Eight Black Swans

About a year ago I read a fascinating book entitled The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. In he describes the impact of the improbable in life and our capacity to cope with it.

The term Black Swan comes from the 17th century European assumption that 'All swans are white'. In that context, a black swan was a symbol for something that was impossible or could not exist.  The Black Swan Theory (according to Nassim Nicholas Taleb) refers to high-impact, hard-to-predict, and rare events beyond the realm of normal expectations.

Taleb's purpose in the book is to build robustness to the negative Black Swan events while exploiting the positive ones. 

The August/September 2009 issue of National Geographic's Adventure magazine describes 8 black swan events and how to survive them.  It's an interesting read.

Tsunami

Could the Cascadia subduction zone, a 680-mile fault line running off the West Coast, unleash a 2004-scale tsunami right here at home?

Drought

The American West is drying up fast. And the next megadrought may bring on the Super Dust bowl.

Avalanche

Last year a perfect storm of conditions killed three skiers, the most avalanche fatalities on ski runs in 30 years. Will climate change bring more slides to a ski area near you?

Megafire

For two decades, western wildfires have grown hotter, burned longer—and become ever more unpredictable. As the climate warms, could big blazes turn into a common hiking hazard?

Power Grid

America’s power supply is primed for an end-of-days blackout

Pandemic

Swine flu? Pffft. Epidemiologists are bracing for a far more lethal bug—one that’ll stop global travel in its tracks.

Failed State

There’s a fine line between off the beaten path and out of control. Sometimes you find it.

GPS System

Satellite navigation works best with 24 functioning orbiters. If several were to switch off, thousands of adventurers could go off course.

How respond to these and other inevitable black swans makes all the difference in the world.

Physical vs. Virtual reality

The following is from Adbusters, an organization that calls itself a "global network of culture jammers and creatives working to change the way information flows, the way corporations wield power, and the way meaning is produced in our society." 

I always explore their magazine of the same name as I personally find it provocative and challenging in these in-between times:

Have you noticed the contours of your life changing with every must-have technological innovation and minute spent on the Internet? Have you detected any differences in your once richly textured, wildly spontaneous way of being? Have you begun to suspect that the more interconnected you are, the flatter, duller and more predictable your existence becomes?

A specter is haunting the mind of the industrialized world – the specter of the virtual.
-Metaverse Manifesto, Orange Montagne

At what point did our computers go from being a tool to enhance our lives to a medium through which to live our lives?
-Alan Beck

As the physical world slips away and our culture flattens, the bluish glow of the virtual realm beckons … Suddenly humanity is faced with an existential choice. Will we take the plunge?

It's On

Southwest Airlines launched a new Ad Campaign on June 1st aimed at tough times. At the end of the ad a narrator intones that the airline doesn't fly around tough times. It's on, and they're ready.

It's on for all us... 

It's on every time our minds persist in discouraging thoughts.

It's on every time we think we can go it alone without the comaraderie of those who care.

It's on every time we stubbornly refuse to admit our fear and hide behind a facade of platitudes.

It's on every time we avoid nourishing our souls with silent listening, contemplation, and transcedent faith.

It's on every time our decisions preclude others who are in greater need.

It's on every time we become too enamored with our technology to solve our problems.

It's on every time we rely on massive military might to secure our happiness.

It's on every time we stop taking initiative for the health of our relationships.

It's on every time we live without grace.

This is the time of our lives. It's tough. It's on. Are you ready?