​As the featured speaker finished reading her short story at the December gathering of readers and writers, an audience member turned to her husband and said, “She’s in love with that story.”
 
It was true. The speaker had realized it herself partway through the reading. She was in love with it, but perhaps only she. The audience wasn’t responding; the trajectory of the story lost its way somewhere in the middle; the characters were too many and indistinguishable from each other; the ending didn’t seem real. The writer had fallen in love with her story and hadn’t realized that the story couldn’t yet stand on its own.
 
How often do we fall in love with our own story, whatever that may be at the time? Perhaps it’s the story of how competent we are, how loved we are, how important, how good, how indispensable we are. Surely the world can’t go on without us and this story.
 
There’s value in falling in love this way. Sometimes it’s what keeps us going, perservering at something we’d be unlikely to pursue were we to stare reality in its face. Often it’s the first phase of an emerging identity, the half-life posing with its grandiose emotionality, pretending it’s the big enchilada.
 
Then again, the falling in love makes us blind to much else and we are likely, when in love with a story, to act on premises that are not true or that make it more difficult for us to connect with others in the worlds that we jointly inhabit.
 
Back to the writer, who next day took her courage in her hands and applied it to a new post on her website. She admitted being in love with her story; she acknowledged her perceptions and realizations as she read the story; she confessed to her fear and desire to end the reading partway through. She vowed she’d go back to the drawing board and take her love to a new level of interest, scrutiny and hard work. Within 24 hours she’d heard back from several colleagues that her realization and her courageous post were models of excellence for her colleagues. The post inspired conversations grounded in the work of writers, readers and listeners about the work and their support of each other in the work.
 
We, too, when we realize our love has led us astray, hold this opportunity and this power in our hands. It’s the opportunity to be genuinely vulnerable. It’s the opportunity to hold our conflicting desires and perceptions in the palms of our hands and stay with the ambiguity and lack of resolution. It’s the power of connecting with others when the defenses are down and we get to smile, weakly or with utter amusement, at our common plight, not knowing what comes next but knowing that we’re in the right place to step gamely into that arena.
 
What’s a story that you’re in love with? How does it impact how you move forward in the world? 

​Recently I was privileged to join a group of Patty Burgin-trained coaches (SeattleCoach) on a white water adventure with Cascade Leadership Challenge, a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing leadership and outdoor adventure opportunities to youth ages 14-20. This is the kind of enterprise where the youth are in charge, with support and guidance from adults.
After the 11-mile trip down the Tieton, we debriefed with the CLC youth over a potluck meal. As the conversation went back and forth with these self-assured youth, they offered a number of lessons they have learned rafting the river.
The one most often heard is the power of feedback. In the natural world, they remind us, feedback is constant and impersonal. The river doesn’t care about you, one way or another. If you fall in the river, you get to deal with it. And in part because these youth, with the wise guidance of their elders, have become not only competent in their technical skills and knowledge but also in their teaming or togetherness, they get to hold themselves accountable. And, with the river (and mountains and oceans) as a metaphor and a model, they can give each other feedback that is constant and impersonal.
What’s the lesson for us in our organizational worlds, indoors and shielded from the clear feedback from our environment? Here are three questions to consider:
What does continual and impersonal feedback look like? It can be about task, process, attitude or intention. It should be guided by standards or norms that are known to the participants, just as they are known for the outdoors: the water is wet, it is cold; the wind and sun and humidity are all knowns.
 
How do you give and receive it? Start with kindness and compassion. Move to standards and expectations. Identify what the vision is, what the goals are. Have a discussion about what the perceptions are, what the theories of action are that accompany one’s approach. Get connected and stay connected.
 
How do you manage the emotional reactivity that arises for oneself and others when feedback of any kind is given? Recognizing the reaction is a start, so that you don’t lapse into an unconscious pattern state. Dealing with the emotions as they arise is next: keeping attention on what is happening. Identifying action choices in the moment completes the cycle.
Feedback: giving and receiving. A key to success.

​My wife is a writer. Part of her work with other writers involves participating in writers’ groups. Most of these involve the writer reading her work and receiving feedback from others about that work.
 
Writers, like all of us, are looking for recognition, perhaps even more so than those of us who get some kind of feedback about our work in the world on an hourly basis throughout the day. So, when another writer praises the work you have just read, it naturally triggers that ego-glow. What happens when the feedback is not on the praise end of the continuum? The ego-defense typically gets triggered, and creativity, graciousness, balance and other good qualities are put at risk.
 
For any of us, the rush to judgment about you-name-it happens quickly, automatically. As the critiquer, it can be an opportunity to highlight our “strengths:” critical thinking, expertise, competence. Usually, we are responding to an ego need above all.
 
What if we were to suspend judgment? Just that: hold whatever is said in our realm of attention as though we were cradling a new-born, holding it secure for the moment in a larger space while we took a good look at it: Is it smiling? Making noises? Breathing evenly? With this living being in my arms, what am I curious about?
 
Next time you recognize the urge to rush to judgment, take a step back and ask:

• What is the thought, the emotion, that is trying to be born at this moment?
• What does it trigger in me as a response? What is there in the thought or emotion that I can be appreciative of?
• What am I curious about? How can I ask for more information without going to judgment?

 
Judgment, evaluation, decision-making: these are all important as we move ahead in our lives and our workplaces. We just go there way too quickly most of the time. Try a break from the ego responses by moving first to appreciation and inquiry. 

These are the words of Cascade Leadership Challenge adult leader Mark Steelquist. He’s referring to the 14 to 20 year olds who have been part of the CLC outdoor challenge activities, and what they’ve learned from their participation in the program. Before we get to what they’ve learned, it’s important to understand how they’ve learned. Generally speaking, these youth (male and female) are connected to each other, the adults in the program, and others in the world through outdoor challenge activities, including river rafting, sea kayaking, rock/mountain climbing, and other outdoor activities that require team work, unforgiving and impersonal feedback, and the development of survival skills and the competencies that go with each of the activities. Foundational elements of the program are cooperation, equity and shared responsibility, and these elements drive the choice of activities and the development of leadership capacity for each of the participants.
 
After a white water rafting trip down the Tieton, a number of life and leadership coaches had the chance to debrief with Mark and the CLC youth. We asked them what they have learned. The lessons include understanding that they get continual and impersonal feedback from the natural world; that they need to work together; that they need to hold each other accountable; and that making a decision quickly and with confidence to follow a pathway is generally more important than which pathway to follow. And, to bring us back to Mark’s quote, that each day’s event is an opportunity for learning.
 
So, what will these youth know what to do when they run into something they’ve never seen before? They’ll know to trust themselves and each other. They’ll know to lean into the experience and give it their full attention. They’ll know the world is a glorious and unforgiving place. They’ll know there’s something there for them to learn from and to share with others.
 
What are your preparations to know what to do when you run into something you’ve never seen before?
Who and what will you trust?
How will you direct your attention?
How will you lean into the experience, connect with others and the world?

For anyone in a position of leadership, there is one essential function of the job that you won’t find on the job description. It is this: managing the emotional reactivity of others. Yet it couldn’t be more obvious or important to the success of whatever enterprise you are engaged in.
 
Consider how often you interact with another person around the following: unclear roles and responsibilities; a change, small or large, that is being made not by the choice of the person involved; a disagreement; the choice of limited resources; stress induced by substantial workloads and a shortage of time. The list could easily be extended across several pages. Much of what happens in an organization triggers some kind of emotional reaction in us. And in our leadership roles, we get to help others manage their emotional reactions.
 
The signs are often clear to us: anger, denial, blame, resistance, lack of engagement. Defenses go up. Fingers point. Creativity, grace, humor, balance, even cognitive engagement: all gone from the moment.
 
In order to help another manage this reactivity, we must be able to manage our own emotions and thoughts. Training ourselves to be alert to these arisings in our own mind and body is a first step. Keeping in attention and not falling into reactivity even as they arise enables us to turn that attention to the reactivity of others. And in order to have an impact on another, we must be and stay connected with them in a personal and emotional way. Our energy has to connect with and help manage theirs: this can be a touch, a word or phrase, silence, a commiseration, an agreement.
 
Then the leadership work begins.