Tag: friendship

Both And

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“Well, you can’t make old friends.” – Zadie Smith

The other day, my mom asked my daughter how her best friend, the little girl that lives next door, was feeling about having to move 1200 miles away in a month. My daughter replied that her friend was excited. And then she added, “And that makes me feel sad.”

The conversation moved on so thankfully I didn’t have to follow-up on that one right away because I find that subject to be tricky. How to be happy for others even when it means a loss for ourselves.

Years ago when I had a corporate job, I hired a former colleague to come work for me. He worked for me for about a year and I had given him some great opportunities and he had done a fantastic job. Then he announced that he’d gotten a job at Microsoft and was quitting and I felt hurt and betrayed. I don’t think I could talk to him at length for a week. Down deep I was happy for him and eventually I got there so I was happier for him up top as well, but I definitely felt the challenge of summoning my best self.

Listening to a Ten Percent Happier podcast with cognitive scientist Maya Shankar gave me some insight on why it’s so hard. She said “We don’t like change because it almost definitionally involves a loss of identity and that’s very destabilizing. I think as humans we often attach ourselves to specific identities as we move through the world because it gives us a sense of security.”

When I use that lens to apply to my work situation with my colleague, I can spot the identity I was inhabiting easily. The man that I hired was also someone I had championed previously when he was switching into the field of technology from his career in the military. I had spent a lot of time and energy helping him adjust to the change of culture and expectations and hopefully imparted some technical knowledge as well. When he quit, it challenged my sense of being a mentor.

In return, he had done the job beautifully and when I got over myself, I could appreciate that. It required me to disconnect from that specific identity to a more general sense which is that I draw a lot of satisfaction from helping other people.

In a quiet moment at the end of the day my daughter made that comment about her friend, I asked her some more questions and we talked about how she could be both/and. That is to say both sad that her friend was leaving and hopeful that her friend has an exciting new adventure when she moves. And that neither takes away from the friendship they have today.

(featured photo from Pexels)

It’s in the Comments

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“To listen with an open heart and ask questions to better help us understand the other person is a spiritual exercise, in the truest sense of the word.” – Harriet Lerner

Yesterday I re-blogged a post about sliding glass door moments, the moments where you see the life you could have on the other side and choose whether to open the door and cross that threshold. Deb commented on it and mentioned that solid door moments, those times when we have no real sense of what’s ahead yet we know we need something in our life to change, might take even more courage to pass through.

Wow, did that make me think. It is just one example of the very many where a comment has expanded the envelope of my thinking. Which is the wonderful effect of comments. They often drive me to a deeper understanding of myself or the topic, sometimes both.

But when I first started blogging, I found commenting hard. Did I know the author well enough that a typed comment would be relevant? Was I interpreting the material correctly and would I be on point?

Maybe first time comments are like tiny solid doors – we often have no real idea who’s on the other side and whether our typed message which is often a bid for friendship will be accepted or even acknowledged. But you have to open it to find out whether or not the person on the other side wants to sit around your coffee table, to use my analogy of blogging from last week, or just speak from the podium.

What do you think about comments? How about the experience of commenting?

Holding Space

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“True friends are those who lift you up when no one else has noticed you’ve fallen.” – unknown

The other night I was reading books with my two-year-old and he whispered in my ear, “You are the best girl.” It was such a sweet and tender moment that gave me the shiver of recognition of what happens when we hold space for one another.

In the Disney Cars movie, Lightning McQueen starts out as the hot shot rookie that only cares about himself until he discovers the feeling of community and values in Radiator Springs and then finally emerges as the worthwhile competitor that knows that there is more to life than winning.

It’s actually in the third installment, Cars 3, that they use the line that Doc Hudson, Lightning’s gruff mentor (voiced by Paul Newman), “Saw something in you that you couldn’t see in yourself.” It’s a wonderful statement about hope and potential.

When we hold space for others, we store the image of their highest, purest selves so that when they are in the messy middle of anything, we can reflect it back to them. This reminds me of friend who became disoriented and demoralized while trying to reach a goal and we sat on a bench overlooking Puget Sound and unraveled why it was she started.

When we hold space for others, we capture the essence of who they are they are in the squishy, vulnerable core underneath any job or external validation so that if they get lost in work or a relationship, we can huddle with them and tell them we still see them.

This brings to me the moment when my friend Doug called to ask if I would climb Mt. Adams with him and his son this summer. He knows I am knee deep in raising these two kids, have been distracted by all that entails and I’ve not been a very present friend, but his offer stirred me deep within and I was so grateful he remembered me.

When we hold space for others as they age, we become the safety line back to the boat of their life, even when they don’t remember themselves. When my great-aunt Wilma was suffering from Alzheimers and nearing the end of her life, her son arrived on his weekly visit to talk with her and bring her favorite treats. She sweetly said to him, “You are so nice. You remind me so much of my beloved son Gary.”

When my son uttered, “You are the best girl.” he was just parroting back what he’s heard said. But he also reminded me that there’s a purity in the simple way he sees me that has everything to do with our relationship and nothing to do with what I accomplish. It made me think that relationships, parenting and families, when they are functional, can be repositories for our essential selves. We hold space for each other for the moments we need to come “home” and recharge.

What does the phrase holding space mean to you? Do you have a good holding space story?

Here and Now

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“How simple it is to see that we can only be happy now, and there will never be a time when it is not now.” Gerald Jampolsky

Last weekend as I was planting some new strawberry plants in a planter next to some well-established ones, the 8-year-old girl from next door reached out to gently finger the leaves. “I am going to move before these strawberries come” she said a little wistfully but not too sadly.

As I wrote about in the post The Long Good-bye, our neighbors and my daughter’s best friend are moving to a city 1,200 miles away in 3 months. Every time I see the girl, she says something about moving.

“I want to ride bikes to school again before we move.”

“I think we are going to start packing soon.”

“Eighty-seven days until we move.”

I asked my daughter how her friend feels about moving she says disappointed to be leaving but excited to have a bigger house. Watching this happy and social child talk about her family’s plans, I recall that before this move came to be, the farthest forward time I ever heard her mention was dinner that night.

I know leaving now to imagine what the future might be like is pointless. More than that, every time I give in to worry over the specifics of how it might come to be I feel the drain of energy and faith that pulls at me.

But there is nothing like watching a child leave right now to visit some fuzzy future to illustrate the point. I see her eyes get a little unfocused as she tries to imagine what her days will hold in this vision she has no control over. Then she gives an almost imperceptible shake and returns.

This little girl calls my daughter her soul sister and me her soul mother. Trying not to mother too much, I mentioned that we don’t even know if the strawberries will bear fruit this year but there were some inside right then if they wanted to taste the present.

Reach Out and Touch Someone

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“Compliment people wherever you go. Praise every single thing you see. Be a ray of sunshine to everyone you meet.” – Rhonda Byrne

A couple of weeks ago my friend, Scott was watching the movie The Net and it reminded him of me. When that movie came out 27 years ago (I looked it up), it was in the brief time we worked together and I commented on a small technical detail about an IP address that pertained to the work we were doing at the time. He saw that detail as he watched the movie again and texted me.

I wonder what it is that makes us pick up the phone when reminded of someone from a long time ago – or answer when someone else does.

It seems like our imaginations often get in the way because I think more often than not I think we think of people and DON’T pick up the phone – we can’t imagine what their reaction will be because it’s been too long or we imagine that it will take more time that we have. And then we stop before we’ve even dialed or written the note.

Many years ago, I had a friend who was writing a novel and was trying to think of a plausible way to introduce time travel. We brainstormed ideas and I remember not having much to offer. Thinking about it now – I realize that reaching out to someone when we think of them is a great way to travel in time.

Because whenever I take the time to pick up the phone, write a letter or make a comment, I get a boost of good feeling. Even in the cases that it doesn’t work out the way I expected, I feel more connected to others for making the effort. It is another way of experience the goodness of our interconnected humanity.

So when Scott texted, I said “yes” to meeting him for tea to catch up. Not only did I get to find out how he, his wife and kids are doing, I got a little chance to travel in time and remember the energy and promise of those days when we were getting paid to wire people to the Internet. It probably was back when AT&T ran the commercials reminding us, “Reach out and touch someone.”

Have you called an old friend lately?

(featured photo from Pexels)

Photos of the week: April 16

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It was just 2 weeks ago that my daughter started paddle boarding with my brother. Now he’s got her paddling on her own, albeit sitting down. I feel like I can completely endorse and celebrate that while complaining that time is going too fast.

The one time in a fortnight (thank you, Ally Bean for reminding me of that word) Mr. D chose not to wear his Superman costume. But thank goodness – he still was able to fly!!
Proof that I take my kids to the best places…this is the viewing room at the transfer station (aka the dump). Seattle Public Utilities has actually done a brilliant job of making learning about garbage interesting by making games of what is trash, recycling and compostable as well as showing the life cycle of trash. A cool place to go — just in time for Earth Day.
When Superman isn’t flying, he’s putting out imaginary fires.
Friendship
Mr D likes to get up early in the morning and get right to work with power tools. We are totally ready for an egg hunt!

The Long Good-Bye

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“The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.” – Henry Miller

I was working on my office yesterday half-listening to my daughter and her best friend chattering about the project they were working on when I suddenly felt a wave of grief. This has been happening on and off since I learned that the best friend and her family, our next door neighbors, will be moving in three months. It’s a very sweet sense of “Wow, I’m going to miss this.”

And then I want to turn it off knowing that it will last for 3 months. That seems like a very long good-bye.

In his book, Predictably Irrational, behavioral economist Dan Ariely talks of his experience when he was a teenager spending months in an Israeli burn ward getting treatment. The hardest part was when the nurses had to change his bandages and they’d work quickly to remove them. They were operating from the reasoning that it would hurt him less if they ripped off the bandages faster.

After he recovered, he actually studied the adage about ripping off the bandage – it turns out that it doesn’t hurt less for the patient (I believe he found that it was the same for the patient either way) but it is easier on the nurse because they don’t have to witness the patient be in agony for as long.

Which tells me what I already intuitively know – that it’s hard to stay open to pain. But the alternative of ripping off the band-aid faster, in the case of my daughter’s friend moving, would be to close ourselves off to the sweet litany of “lasts” that we’ll be able to do.

Instead I snapped a picture (the featured photo) of the two girls sitting as they usually do, practically on top of each other, taking up about one foot of a seven foot couch. We won’t always have the luxury of being so near so I’m working on celebrating every inch of it.

The people that I haven’t had the opportunity to say goodbye to, like my dad who passed suddenly in a bike accident, have left me with an appreciation for the bittersweet good-bye, even though it is so hard to do well.

What about you – do you rip the band-aid, real or metaphorical, off slowly or quickly?

Facing Our Fears Together

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“Be a lamp, a lifeboat or a ladder.” – Rumi

At bedtime last night my 6-year-old confessed to me that she runs ahead on the way to bed so that she can check under the bed for thieves. Not burglars, not robbers but thieves. But it was such an intimate moment that I didn’t ask about the word selection.

It struck me as I was listening what a privilege it is to hear someone else’s fears. Because what seems so real to us can feel childish to someone else. I remember confessing shortly after my daughter was born to a friend who doesn’t have kids that this was the hardest thing I’d ever done. My friend laughed, not unkindly but dismissively and I felt so exposed that I couldn’t say more.

Conversely I have friends to whom I can tell my biggest fears and know they won’t talk me out of them but instead will help me walk through them. In this way each monster we’ve faced together has been a bridge to closeness. It’s created the bond of facing things together.

When I’ve been the one entrusted with a friend’s hardship, I feel the honor of providing reassurance. Life has taught me we all fear different things but trust is built when we honor that they are real to the person who faces them.

So I told my daughter that it’s unlikely a thief would be patient enough to wait under the bed but I’d help her check. And I told her that when I was her age that I feared snakes under my bed. She thought that was weird until I told her that I had a prized set of four National Geographic books – puppies, kittens, frogs and snakes. I loved the puppies and kittens but I was fascinated by the snakes. So I could totally picture the hooded King Cobra ready to strike unless I cleared the bed by a good margin.

We talked about the probability that when her little brother is 6-years-old, he’ll probably have his own thing that he fears and she prepared her answer for how she’ll reassure him. Hand-in-hand we talked about facing our fears, looked under the bed and then had a great night’s sleep.

(featured photo by Pexels)

Fantasy Climbs

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“One climbs, one sees. One descends, one sees no longer, but one has seen. There is an art in conducting oneself in lower regions by memory of what one has seen higher up. When one can no longer see, one can at least still know.” – Rene Daumal

I felt my phone ping with a message while I was trying to get dinner on the table the other night. At that moment, one little person wanted raw carrots instead of the perfectly grilled carrots and needed more hummus. The other little person was tired and having a moment of personal crisis and didn’t want to eat at all. As I was shuttling between kitchen and table, I snuck a glance at the message. It was my friend inviting me on a mountain climb of Mt. Adams with him and his son this summer.

Oh, it was so easy to envision myself away from that disastrous dinner and instead picture eating instant noodles from a tin cup on the side of a mountain at our base camp at 9,750 feet. I felt like it would be a complete luxury to say “yes” to climbing and trade in the work of parenting for a couple of days of slogging up a mountain with only the sound of our breathing and our footsteps crunching in the snow.

Even though I could rationalize how safe a climb Mt. Adams is with no crevasses or avalanche danger and rest in the reassurance of climbing with a friend that I’ve summitted that mountain twice with, I knew I’d have to say “no.”

Because even a safe mountain climb means being on the side of a 12,281 foot mountain for a couple of days, exposed to weather and human frailty. And in the very slight case that anything happened and I got hurt or dead, I’d be so angry at myself for leaving behind two young kids. Even if I was dead – I’d be dead and angry!

It highlighted for me the wide chasm between who I am now and who I used to be before kids. First of all, I’m entirely flattered that my friend thinks I could make it up Mt. Adams.

Secondly, it was a moment of realization of how completely my priorities have changed thinking about how I use my time, not only for the climb but also the commitment it would take me to get in shape to climb again.

But most of all, it made me feel yet again the wonderful work of our friends as they hold space for us when we are otherwise occupied, off on our quests to find meaning or just not feeling ourselves. Those friends that we can journey through all the phases of life and still find something to talk about with are a sacred gift.

So I told my friend, with a huge heaping of gratitude, that I’d have to take a rain check until I get my kids in shape and we can all climb together. In lieu of me going, his son is going to borrow my backpack and ice axe so a little bit of me is going by proxy instead. Maybe I’ll get to send my tin cup also so it can have dinner on the mountain too!

(photo is mine – of sunset from base camp on Mt. Adams)

Friendship Brownies

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“A friend may well be reckoned the masterpiece of nature.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

I was talking to my friend, Doug, the other day. He is planning a climb of Mt. Adams with his son this summer. It’s a 12,280 foot mountain in Washington State – tall enough to be a challenge but not technical enough to need a lot of equipment and training. The last time we summitted this mountain was with his daughter about 10 years ago when she was 14 years old.

Doug wanted to know if I remembered what packs we carried between our camp at about 9,000 feet and the summit. He is a meticulous packer and doesn’t carry anything more on his back than necessary.

These questions reminded me of a time we were planning a climb on Mt. Rainier that would take place over Doug’s birthday. His wife asked me if I would carry some brownies up to celebrate Doug’s birthday. It was only after I happily agreed that she told me that Doug said he wouldn’t carry them because he didn’t want that unnecessary weight in his pack.

It is probably because of all this carrying of loads that makes one of my favorite meditations is one where I imagine I sit down, empty everything out of my pack, look carefully at each thing I’m carrying. When I’m done sorting through the worries, the presumptions, and fears as well as the love, the purpose, the nostalgia, the energy stored for digging deep, the vulnerability, I mentally load the pack again with only what I need. I always carry a lighter load after that meditation.

But in thinking about those brownies, I realize that friendship means we are willing to carry things for other people that they won’t carry for themselves.

We hold in our packs a version of our friends at their brightest and most creative that can be shown to them when they are in a slump. We carry memories of the times we laughed, did silly things, failed and succeeded. We store all the depth of the ways we have walked side by side on the path as well as the times we waited at an intersection while they took a detour and vice versa.

Then at just the right moment, we unpack the brownies we’ve carried so far and celebrate our friends. There are some things worth the extra weight and friendship is one of them.

(featured image from Pexels)