Same Path, Different Perspective

When I asked my kids about their favorite and least favorite aspects of our recent road trip, I got:

“The oil fields were interesting.”

“There were weapons sold at every rest stop!”

“I wish I had tried Popeye’s buffalo chicken strips.”

Umm… were we all on the same trip?  I was momentarily horrified.  Here I thought I as providing cultural exposure and quality family time for my offspring.  And the best my 15 year old can come up with is a wistful wish for Popeye’s buffalo chicken strips?

Even while on the same path physically, we were on different mental and emotional journeys.  Have you ever left a meeting and heard a coworker complain, “I can’t believe he said that!” and go on to vent about a comment that you had interpreted as innocuous?  And suddenly you realize that your coworker’s interpretation of the words has more to do with what she is thinking and feeling rather than the meaning of the words actually uttered – or the intent of the speaker.

This is how a lot of miscommunication happens. I may be in the shade of a tree with a bird ready to poop on my head, while my coworker is soaking up the warmth of the blazing sunlight less than two feet away. And my sunbathing pal is horrified at the bird droppings adorning my head, but being of Russian descent, I believe this is a symbol of good luck and coolly use a handkerchief to clean up my good fortune. Different perspectives.  Same path.

It can be easier to spot these gaps in perspective with your family or your coworkers when you’re experiencing the same event from differing points of view.  But what happens when conflicting points of view are warring within yourself?

A few years ago, I was standing in my boss’ office being berated for the way I handled a confrontation with a coworker earlier that week.  I stood there, a bundle of conflicting feelings as I run the scenario over again in my head and consider how I could have handled things differently.

• I am upset with myself that I mishandled the situation.
• I am not sure I mishandled it.
• I am confused at the context in which I am receiving the feedback, as this was not the intent of the meeting with my boss.
• I want to apologize for my error and ask how to make it right. I want to point out that idiots are idiots and I am not responsible if they misunderstood my comment.
• I want to find a way to soften my approach in the future.
• I want to rebel against any suggestion that I cannot be myself.

The paths clashing within me were not my view of the confrontation versus my boss’… the conflict waging was how to respond in that moment.  My head was trying to rationalize what felt like an attack, not feedback, by my boss.  My emotions wanted to vigorously defend how I handled my coworker.  My head said this is not my best course of action.  I felt battered and picked-on. I thought, if I speak rationally, I can make her understand my point of view.  I thought, maybe there is a hard truth I need to hear.  I wanted to burst out with all the passion I felt building in me.

So what do I do?

Nothing.  I did not acquiesce that I made a mistake nor did I defend my actions.  I took it in.  I watched everything I was feeling and thinking.  I watched my boss continue to talk.  This resulted in two
important realizations:

• By not responding with my heart and launching into a vehement defense, I did not escalate a conversation that was already not going well.  I gave myself space to feel uncomfortable and unhappy, but didn’t give in to a resume-producing outburst.  The feelings passed – but believe me, I felt them very thoroughly first.
• By not responding with my head, I gave myself the space to acknowledge that while my head is logical, my gut sometimes knows what it’s talking about, too.   I didn’t submit to the initial, “smarter” impulse to agree with my boss and try to fix things.   Instead, I let her present her argument and gave myself space to consider it.

Those two things allowed me to walk out of that meeting without having lost my head or my self-confidence. I gave myself time and space to evaluate the situation more objectively.  And by letting silence be my response, my boss over-explained her view which revealed other motives for this unexpected “feedback session.”  And I realized, we were in the same meeting but she was coming to the crossroads from a completely different direction.  Understanding that direction let me put the feedback into context – and let me re-examine the confrontation with the coworker in a new way.

Did I learn from it?  Absolutely.  I learned how easy it is to have a different perspective of the path.  Even in our own minds and our heart.  And I learned that for mine to work together, sometimes I have to give them a bit of space.

And now… I have to take my 15 year old to Popeye's… some buffalo chicken is calling our name.

Lesson Six: Frost had it right - when paths collide, take the one less traveled by

There comes a point where paths don't merely cross, they collide.

New Orleans is one of those collision points.  It's where the French and Spanish collided in the Rebellion of 1768.  It's where slaves collided with slave owners in the 1811 German Coast Uprising, the largest slave rebellion in U.S. history. It's where natural gas resources, the railroad and the cotton press collided with the local economy.  It's where immigrants from France, Germany, Spain, Haiti, and Cuba collided with the American and Native American inhabitants to create a unique and highly diversified culture. And it's where, in 2005, Hurricane Katrina collided with the vibrant city, resulting in an estimated $100 billion in economic losses.

It was in this city of color and chaos that our road trip enjoyed a short respite.  Our own paths were colliding inside the tiny Corolla: no one liked my Richard Castle audiobook so I could only listen when everyone else slept. David's long legs limited the time he spent in the back seat, much to the annoyance of his shorter siblings.  Liam's snoring prevented the others from sleeping and was loud enough to interfere with any audiobook enjoyment. The bickering over radio stations, snack stops and the best character in the NightWing universe was escalating.  It was time for some space and a little non-driving adventure.  New Orleans, city of collisions, seemed as good a place as any for a breather.

Other paths crossed in New Orleans.  The kind of paths we navigate every day, no matter where we are.  After four days of vagabond adventure, it was time for the ones I had crossly pushed aside in the name of the vacation and family path. The Work-Me path was wondering when I'd finally respond to the 200+ inquiries piling up in my inbox about the projects on hold. The Friend-Me path was wondering when I'd be online again and back for the regular chats and IMs. The Household-Me path reminded me that two bills still needed to be paid and that I ought to check in with the cat sitter. And the Personal-Me Path?  The Personal-Me path wondered when I would run again and get back to reading my Joyce Carol Oates novel.

How many paths criss-cross your world? Two things struck me as I sat down to confront all my colliding paths. First, it's exhausting. Juggling, multi-tasking, call it what you will.  It's really just a lot of competing priorities demanding your time and energy.  And it doesn't really matter which path you choose to focus on first, or how you attempt to combine and consolidate. It's a lot of work and it leaves you drained.  Second, the one path that can help revitalize us and empower us to better manage the other competing paths is indeed that one less traveled by.  It's the first path we push aside. It's the Personal-Me path that give us the space to recharge, to think, and to bring our best possible selves to all our other paths.

Sure, it's cliche to say you have to build in personal time, you need to treat yourself to something just for you.  We push this path aside first because it's everyone else's paths that demand our attention.  We prioritize the needs of our family, friends and coworkers over our personal needs because it's easier to justify doing something, anything, for someone else rather than indulging what we perceive to be a selfish act.

But it's not indulgence. It's care. When the Personal-Me path is left untended, it gets overgrown and hard to find again.  The journey back to it can arduous.  It becomes a tangled, weedy mess that collides with the other paths you are fighting so hard to cultivate and manage.  It starts to spread its hungry, choking vines around your other paths, inhibiting your ability to keep them clear.

If we let the Personal-Me path remain the one less traveled by, it does indeed make all the difference.

Lesson Five: Remembering the Alamo doesn't have to mean defeat

Cruising to San Antonio - a short drive that day, less than three hours from desolate Sonora - I listened to my offspring share what they knew about the history of the Alamo.

"It's like 300… only in the Southwest and there were only 200 of them."

"The guy in the 'coon hat died there.  I'm going to get one of those hats."

"Davy Crockett, stupid."

I'll give them credit: they remembered more details… that the historic battle lasted 90 minutes, that there's speculation that Davy Crockett didn't die in battle at all, but was actually executed afterwards… and that the famous battle cry from Sam Houston a month later - Remember the Alamo! - reclaimed Texian victory in just 18 bloody minutes.

But the comparison with 300 caught my attention… tragic, gut-ripping defeats that, like a classic kung-fu drama, leaves no one alive.  Why does that appeal to us?  What draws us towards the fight we know we can't win? We flock to the movies that tell these stories… and often times, we willingly enter into office drama and politics with parallel effect.



Martyrdom, Tragedy and Utter Disaster
Ok, so maybe you're not fleeing your formica desk and Dell laptop (or perhaps maple and Macbook) for a fatal engagement on the battlefield with your flintlock… but then again, maybe you are.  We walk into situations every day where we can't win. How do you handle Captain Kirk's Kobayashi Maru

scenario? Captain James T. Kirk took the opportunity to "alter the parameters of the game"  and win the un-winnable.  We find ourselves in these situations - sometimes by choice, sometimes we are pushed - and what we do next is the difference between your Alamo or your Kobayashi Maru moment.

Last year I wrote about intentional pauses - in dialogue and decision making.  When walking into the no-win scenario, these pauses determine just how you lose: there is martyrdom, such as the Alamo and 300, there is pure tragedy, as in Curse of the Golden Flower and House of Flying Daggers,  and there is utter disaster like The Battle of Cannae and the Bay of Pigs (these, while they are certainly tragedies, the tactical and military mis-steps overshadow everything else).  The best possible outcome? That you situate yourself think like James Kirk and change the game at hand.

That's what a pause can do for you.  Before you react to an unfair criticism, before you offer an opinion that is unsolicited, before you step into an escalating debate as peacemaker… pause. Is what you're about to say Right Speech, (Right Speech is the third of the eight-fold path in Buddhism)?  Right Speech is spoken at the right time, in truth, with compassion, for a benefit and with the intent of goodwill.  That's five simple but powerful rules.  The world would be a much quieter place if we all adhered to even three of those five rules.

Lesson Five: Remembering the Alamo doesn't' have to mean defeat
For a benefit is key.  In our daily mini-Alamos or Kobayashi Marus, what is the outcome you hope to achieve with your next words? To avoid martyrdom, tragedy or utter defeat, what needs to be said?  I believe in speaking your mind and being yourself. But I have also learned the lesson - multiple times and I am still learning it - that taking that pause and carefully considering impact of my next word or action can either trigger the major battle or diffuse it.

Whether you walk into an ambush or are pushed into the middle of a political drama, take a moment to think of Captain Kirk crunching into that apple while everyone around him was in a tizzy.  He wasn't going to play their game and he wasn't going to play it their way.  You can kill anger with kindness… you can also crush a passive-aggressive attack with a show of force.  Which you choose to use, how you choose the change the game, depends entirely on what's happening in your Kobayashi Maru moment and who your other players are.  So pause. Pay attention. And use your Right Speech with deliberation.

Davy Crockett and King Leonidas didn't have the option of words in a cubicled workplace or over a conference room table.  And what drove them to un-winnable situation were broader themes of glory and political independence.  Well, in our mini-Alamos, we also fight for recognition and kudos, and we navigate office politics.  Fortunately, no one's standing there with a musket or spear… but some days it feels like it, doesn't it?

Lesson Four: My Children are Hobbits

"Stop touching my stuff!" 

"I don't want to go."

"Do we have to actually look at it?"

"Get your stuff off my seat!"

From the spectacular caves underneath the dusty pothole that was Sonora, the adventure of history beckoned.  I have avid historians in my brood… experts in Ancient Greece and Rome, Medieval European wars, Japanese samurai battles (and the ronin, of course), and all things World Wars related, I and II.  But the American Southwest?  Yawn…

But this is our own backyard… part of our vast and varied American culture.  This was also Day Three in a reliable but cramped Corolla in which the snacks were a little, shall we say, wilted… and tempers were a tiny bit crispy.  Thus, heading east to the Alamo carried a cacophony of whines, sulks and snark.  My young adults regressed to tiny tots… 

Lesson Four: Hobbits love the Shire. And food. So do my children.

"That's it!" I finally hit my limit.  In the tight little Corolla, even my usually optimistic gypsy nature is a bit frayed.  "You just want to eat, sleep and stay home.  And eat again.  We don't need second breakfast.  You're like Hobbits!  But I am Gandalf, damn it, and you are going on an adventure.  And you will like it."

Adventures… we have them at home, at work and, clearly, on the road.  Some people gravitate towards the mystery and risk inherent therein.  Some people fear them, the lack of control and predictability.

We learn new things when we go on adventures. At work, each new project is an adventure.  It might be with new coworkers we haven't yet worked closely with or it might be a new initiative that changes the way a team or department works.  Several years ago, I was part of a team managing the acquisition of a 200 person company into our own - our largest acquisition to date. I was paired with a project manager who was also my closest office friend.  After several weeks on this high stress project, I learned that I love her… and never wanted to work that closely with her again.  The funny woman who waffled about where we'd eat lunch each week was a rigid and harsh taskmaster if the tasks wavered at all from the project plan.  The flexibility in our personal time was no where present in our professional work.  It was a painful project. It ended all right, but the next time we were assigned a joint project, I was far better prepared to manage the new personality that had emerged.

Leaving the comfort of the Shire is a difficult boundary to cross sometimes.  Sometimes the Shire is a job we don't like, but don't feel safe leaving.  Sometimes the Shire is a relationship.  Sometimes, it's a habit… ordering the same meal at the same restaurant every time, for example.  Adventures can be small things - coloring your hair, finding a new coffee shop, speaking up when you'd normally stay silent.  We all have our Shires.  Do you know what yours is?

My Hobbits are more like Bilbo and Frodo than Sam

On our Corolla Adventure, I learned that my youngest son would eat anything we put in front of him. Including the scorpion inside the green candied lollipop.  I learned that my oldest son is fascinated by military maps.  He studies the details of the locations, the battle movements and the redeployment of forces.  And I learned that my daughter, usually such a control-freak-planner for every moment of her day, was able to let go of needing to know what was going to happen every minute, every day, and enjoy a spontaneous side trip to an unexpected (but glorious) shoe sale.  Yes, it set us back 40 minutes off our schedule. She didn't care.

In the end, what I actually learned is that my children are Bilbo type Hobbits. Initially reluctant, but curious enough to take the chance on an adventure after all. The only Hobbit aspect that they can't let go of is that damned second breakfast.


(My own Hobbits… left, David studying maps; top right, Liam before the scorpion snack; bottom right, Claudia on the Riverwalk in San Antonio, just prior to shoe shopping)

Lesson Three: What Lurks Beneath the Surface

Miles and miles of Texas oilfields. Endless horizon of hazy clouds.  An even, steady whirring comes from the backseat where my youngest is snoring.  My oldest is also dozing back there, headphones firmly implanted… the placement of the purple earbuds seems to be permanent.  In the front with me is my middle one, gazing at the endless panorama of dirt, scrub, tumbleweeds and oil field pumps.  There is no where to go but forward on the two lane road and there is no escape from the quiet inside our overpacked Toyota Corolla.

Quiet allows many things to happen… I can be with my own thoughts, let them roil and spread, and examine them more closely.  I can observe what's around me, what's happening and what's not happening, and take it in for what it is. Most important, in a quiet moment with another soul, you can listen.

In business, I have learned the value of silence. When you allow silence to hang, to expand into the space of that moment, to let silence alone be the answer… or sometimes the question… you learn more than if you tackled the topic directly.  Most of us are so uncomfortable with "awkward silences" that we rush to fill them.  And in our haste, the usual filters become flimsy - we are filling a void, not constructively participating in a dialogue.

Silence reveals the stuff beneath the surface.  In that meeting with the uncomfortable pause, you can observe which of your coworkers rushes to fill that void first, and what he/she fills it with.  Sometimes the information filling the void can be more uncomfortable than the original silence.  You have to learn in those moments not to respond to the rush, not to help the other person fill the void.  But listen carefully to what he or she is filling it with and decide, consciously, how to respond. It can be tough. Because what he/she fills it with is a little bit like receiving a drunk text at midnight from one of them - it's raw, unfiltered thought.  But it's definitely enlightening.

Lesson Three: What lurks below doesn't have to be filled with drama
Teens are different, however. Have you met a teen uncomfortable with silence? Mine are not.  After a brief conversation about the history of the oil fields - David is a history buff and could share plenty of facts - he sat in that front seat for over an hour, not feeling the need to say a word. And not seeming antsy or bored, either.  As his mother, perhaps I should have been more concerned about the idea of him brooding or peppered him with questions about his school and his friends while we had a rare moment of just the two of us as his siblings slept.  But I let the silence be.

Dave occasionally turned to smile at me, or make a random comment… through these short conversations, I glimpsed what was going on underneath the surface of my son.  There is no big reveal here.  There was no dramatic confession, no sharing of secrets.  But in the quiet moments amid brush and big rigs, Dave let me see what was going on in his head, the inane, the serious, the funny. Silence was communication, too.  Recognition that we did not have to speak to be understood.

Sometimes, though, what lurks below is all drama
After hours of oil fields, we were ready for something different.  But rolling into Sonora, Texas, wasn't going to offer that to us. I was tempted to skip our planned sight-seeing - the Caverns at Sonora - and just head straight for New Orleans.  I rationalized that I may never be back in Sonora again, however, and should at least go take a peek.  Above ground, Sonora offered nothing but a Dairy Queen and Sonic Drive-In.  Not promising.

Below ground… the caverns were breathtaking.

We were on a two mile walk with a young tour guide named Logan from Wisconsin. He had come out to Sonora to work in the oil fields but wasn't old enough to drive the rigs, so he came to the caves.  When Logan turns 21, he plans to work in the oil fields and save money for college. Meanwhile, he worked in these beautiful underground tunnels that housed nature's secret artwork.

For one moment, Logan had us sit on wooden benches placed in a small cavern.  We had just come down 150 feet underground.  "I want you to see something," he said. "I need you all to sit very still and be very quiet."  And he tripped the light switch.

Absolute darkness.  Absolute silence.

"There are few places in the world where you can fully experience the loss of both sound and light.  But this is it."