Solo Reflection: Nine Conversations, Three Threads

Mark Poiesz: Welcome to Because This Matters Episode ten. This is a solo episode for reflection on the first nine conversations with the guests that have come on. I wanted to point out some themes that I've noticed, talk about a few things that surprised me, and share a few of my takeaways in case they're useful for you on your journey. Mm. When I started this podcast, the intention was to have it be centered on the personal values that drive each of us. And I didn't know how I would necessarily have that theme show up each time, but it's surprised me that there have been a few things that really stand out as deeper takeaways than surface level value statements or even actions or some of the incredible work that some of these guests do. All these guests came from really different backgrounds. There have been musicians, educators, military leaders, executives, advocates, founders, parents, so many different people out of these nine. And I noticed that there are three themes that kept recurring again and again compassion, humility, and relationship. These didn't show up as ideals always that people led with, but they showed up as practices and ways of being as they would tell their stories. These seem like they are a deeper compass for how many of us can move through the world. The first theme may have stood out from the very beginning as both Joe Arius and Nasim Lari oriented around compassion, each in their own unique ways. And they weren't talking about compassion as a means of being nice or as a means of agreeing with other people, just a base willingness to understand another person's experience and willingness to risk the openness that's required of us if we really want to be showing up with compassion. Check out what Nassim had to say. Compassion has been really huge, and I think, you know, obviously just being in the healthcare space, I think that's really significant, but also in shaping any kind of team that you're putting together for any kind of work. I think that's really a key responsibility. We are all tied together as human beings. This is in our relationships, this is at work, this is, you know, going to a restaurant, ⁓ ordering something from the from the wait staff. And I think that's a the compassion is a really big one because we're all as individuals going through different things all the time. And so just bringing that awareness to any interaction I think is really important. But then also even in in the workspace when you're trying to solve A problem, being able to identify the bigger problems that exist and you want to bring solutions for, it requires some level of understanding of other people's experiences to be able to identify those challenges. So when you have a conversation with a client, being able to understand that person, having compassion for their bigger, biggest concerns. What keeps them up at night? I think that gives you a better understanding of what that person needs and how you can help address that that problem. What I love about Nassim's orientation is that compassion is not separate from effectiveness. It's something that makes effectiveness possible on a deeper level. And the more deeply we understand people, the more effectively we can serve them in any of the number of ways that. Our work would have us do so. Joe raised compassion from another fascinating angle. How do I understand more about other people in the world from a sense of being more compassionate to them? Because if I understand your baseline morals and ethics derived from whatever religion that you're coming from, then maybe I can understand why you're doing something. Again, it has to come back. compassion for me. I think it has to come back to trying to understand other people and where they're coming from. You know, here in the West, not just America, but in the West, we come from a place of we tell history through our eyes and our lens, and everything we do is right. If we don't take time to understand other people's customs, cultures, and and ethics and and morals and what they value, then all we're gonna do is consciously or unconsciously demonizes other individuals. Now, to be fair, if someone's customs, cultures and ethics and morals are resulting in the physical harm, the emotional harm, or the oppression of another group of individuals, then that's unacceptable. At the very least, we have to let's hear from them first, right? Why do you believe what you believe? I think if we can do that, we're gonna be in a better place. but I think it comes down to you ha you have to at least be willing to hear other people's sides of the story or of their story in general. Joe's insights call to attention something that really stayed with me, that understanding or compassion is not always necessarily meaning agreement. It's something that can soften our judgment of other people if we're willing to step into that space. Likewise, Nancy talked about compassion and openness to being in a way that was really embodied and light, but exceptionally difficult for so many of us to orient ourselves around in a day-to-day. Check this out. At least in my mind, I'm walking around seeing everybody like that. I'm seeing how you walk, I see how you look, I see how you dress, and I'm affected by all of that. I hear what you're saying. And at the same time I'm thinking, who is this guy? Who is this soul? Who who's in there? You know? And where did they come from and what are they doing there? That is just so exciting to me. I don't know why. I just get such a kick out of people. But it's because I'm feeling them in all those different ways at once I find them intriguing. Do you notice how Nancy wasn't talking about compassion as a feeling or an emotion? Compassion was a way of being and a way of seeing the world around her. That compassion and openness is a recognition of the shared humanity that is so central to her life and her work. Joe, Nassim, and Nancy all pointed toward different aspects of the same thing. Compassion begins with curiosity and openness. It asks the question, what might I not understand yet? And that exploration is one that can take a lifetime because the world around us is always shifting and evolving. Another theme that I want to point out is one of humility. This one surprised me because so many of my guests in this first series are high achievers, each in their own way. And I didn't necessarily expect for humility to be something that rises so prominently through a conversation. I thought it might be something that we touch on as a nice to have. But so many of my guests in these first nine presented humility as a strength. There was a willingness to be teachable. And a willingness to let life change us, however it might, instead of us clinging to a fixed version of self. I think the guest that encompassed this most dramatically was Alison Krebs. A lot of people said that I failed. They viewed it as a failure in my life when those eight years were done. Because I didn't make any money. From a worldly sense, there was no value. If anything, it disturbed some people where they thought that I really should, you know, walk away. However, I saw the value. The value was I was actually becoming a human being. As I fell into really confusing and difficult bottoms in my life, I had to realize that that wasn't working. And I had to find some people call it God. There's very lovely many names out there. I I call it God. I had to find why in the world that what I was doing was not working, and I knew it should be. And so I had to get out of the way and allow these. powers that are much greater than I into my life. That would make me need to stay in humility. So no matter what happens, I believe everything is perfectly crafted for each one of us. And so no matter what's coming at me, that's the that's the good. It's not what I think is good or bad. It might be easy to hear that amount of humility and forget just how much Alison accomplished in her life in corporate leadership. Yet what she learned moves her forward the most is not a clinging to what she's done, but an openness to what the moment and life might be asking her to be. Alison kind of challenged some of our assumptions about achievement because growth doesn't always look impressive through a lens of humility. Sometimes growth just looks like being more honest with ourselves, being more present, and being more human with all of the flaws that come with that. In episode five, Steve Rucker offered up something that might have gone right by some listeners without them noticing. Steve said more than one time that in five years, who knows, something else might be happening. And I think he said he might live in Paris, I might be a mechanic. Right? That's my current thing. You know, who knows? We may have this conversation in five years. It's like I'm I'm you know, I'm an auto mechanic or something, you know, I'm doing that. Who knows? Hey man, I might be, you know, five years from now living in Paris and you know, being a sculptor, a painter, or something. Who knows? Who knows what might happen? Flexibility, you know? And along with that comes openness, right? I think. when you talk about that concept about ⁓ kind of being ready for anything, I you know, that's maybe something we've been talking about this this whole time. ⁓ people find a way, that's flexibility, right? Yeah. That's openness. Throughout that whole interview, Steve resisted the idea that he is a fixed identity. He actually advocated for flexibility toward the end. He has an openness to discover who he might become that doesn't rely on any fixed labels. Of course, there's humility all over that because it would be easy to forget that Steve is a world class musician, a legendary educator, and an accomplished programmer among many other things. Yet none of that drives his sense of identity. As much as this humility and flexibility that he embodies as he discovers what life has for him. Dr. Heather Baker encompassed the humility angle in a different way. Although she touched on it multiple times as she told her story about sudden cardiac arrest, her recovery, and her subsequent efforts with advocacy and training, really Heather offered up something later in our conversation that hit to the core. Of what embodied humility really looks like. It really didn't hit me that I needed a change until one day we were playing at home, and I have a three-year-old and he's very sassy. And I said, I love you. And he said, I love daddy. And I'm like, Yeah, yeah, like typical three-year-old. He's kind of trying to hurt my feelings because he has fun. And I said, ⁓ you don't love mommy. And he said, Well, I love daddy, and mommy loves work. And it was A sucker punch to the gut. It knocked the wind out of me. And in that moment, I said, something is not right. I didn't want my son, I don't want my son to ever grow up thinking that he wasn't my number one priority. So I sought out this position that will be less day-to-day stress, closer to home, in the building where my son will be. So I won't ever have to miss, you know, the first day of school, a class party, ⁓ anything. I'll be able to just In that moment, the conversation between Heather and I transformed from being one about what happened to her and how she's leveraged it to support others, to even touching on this deeper sense of humility that her three-year-old son could evoke in her as he points out somewhere that something could still be adjusted. He evoked Heather's sense of balance and called on her To make even more courageous changes to her life without putting other important things down. He reflected something to her that she couldn't ignore, and she was willing to let it change her. That's why she's changing jobs this summer. It would be fair to summarize humility as a willingness to remain open, open to feedback, to growth, to reality and what it's asking us to become in our life. But I think that What's most fascinating is that humility requires a humility of its own to recognize that it's not something we ever master. Each of these people is demonstrating a continued openness to discover what it might look like in the very next moment or the next phase of their life. I found that particularly inspiring from each of them. The third theme was relationships. Nobody described their story or their growth or even their values orientation as a solitary process. Everyone talked about how their growth happened through mentors and friends, teachers and students that they have. There's a sense of community that builds each of us up, whether we are giving or receiving in the moment. It's something that becomes part of what forms us over and over and over again. Check out what Rich Redmond said on this point. And then it also deepens the idea that my way to give back in life is to be generous and to help other people grow and achieve their dreams. And I just mentor, mentor, mentor, mentor. Nine times out of ten, that song that you're recording for that person that moved to Nashville a couple of years ago with a with a suitcase and a couple of songs, ⁓ most likely it's not going to be a hit. Most likely they're not going to get a record deal. So what is important about that day? Yes, I'm getting paid, but the most important part of that day is getting to work my craft and being in the presence of all those people where we mix business and pleasure. We're actual friends in real life. Maybe we don't see each other as often as we would like to. ⁓ but it's that communal experience that we're having. Monday on that recording session was about that moment in time and the experience that those five people had together. And if I'm if I if there's a time in my life that I'm not doing that, ⁓ I'm gonna miss the people. You might remember from that episode that Rich has an entire framework for speaking called the Crash Course for Success. R in Crash is standing for relationships, so Rich doesn't skip how important this is, but it's something that he still embodies himself. It's not just a talking point. Despite Rich's remarkable success as a performer and a speaker and an author, helping other people grow is one of the ways that he is continuing to invest in relationships in his current phase of life. And in episode six, Melissa reminded all of us that relationships require a certain amount of grace. She encouraged us to think about the truth that everybody is carrying burdens that we can't see and that we might never understand. Same way you have your own stuff going on, other people have their stuff. You don't know what's happening over there. Just give people the slack you would want for yourself. Of course, Melissa could have had an academic orientation to that because She has training and works in a field of school psychology. But the real key that we could hear in her voice and in her experiences that she shared is that this is something to live each day. It's not a competency that she shows up with at work. And sometimes you do things with other people that you may not necessarily like, but it's because they love it and it's important to spend time with each other. And that's something that's something that kind of clicked with me like, ⁓ still not a beach person, but I will go to be social. There's a real orientation to this, to the relationships that she is supporting, that's so key for how she shows up. Chad Bernstein touched on this point from the angle of mentoring. Of course, that is the chief part of his work with guitars over guns, the nonprofit that he founded. But he calls out mentoring as one of the most powerful ways relationships can show up beyond just friendship. So if we really care, we will challenge those around us and we'll be willing to be challenged by them. That's a beautiful thing that that mentorship taught me. There's something I heard the other day that was like the difference between a mentor and a friend is that a friend will care more about your friendship than your success. A mentor will care more about your success than your friendship. And You need both. Like you need a balance of that in your life because not everyone's gonna put your aspirations and goals ahead of the comfort of like just just wanting to be there and and like support you and listen and not challenge you because you need that, you know. But a a mentor will risk your friendship or how much you care about them or like them in the moment, knowing that they're challenging your success in a way that's best for you in their mind. I love that Chad called that out because it points to the fact that relationships aren't always just feel good friendships. Real transformational growth requires people or circumstances to challenge us. Sometimes they'll be calling out something that we don't see yet and it doesn't feel good, it doesn't feel like a friendship feels. But that's one of the ways that relationships can show up for the benefit of ourselves and others, whether we are giving or receiving that support. Throughout each of those three, I feel like it's clear that nobody becomes who they are alone. Every one of these pointed to the importance of relationships in growing and in also having the opportunity to live their values, because otherwise they might just be abstract concepts that we think about once in a while. Relationships are usually the vehicle through which growth appears in our lives. So looking back at nine episodes of I knew going in that I wouldn't just be having conversations with successful people about what they did. I wanted to go deeper and look at why they do what they do. I wanted to shine a light on the challenges that they're finding that the rest of the world wouldn't know about unless they spoke about it. And I wanted to get a sense for how they relate to their own trajectory of growth and how they think about growth happening to them. And around them and within them as life progresses. Each of these conversations felt in its own way to me like a testament of becoming, that we're not finished and we're seeing ourselves evolve, and even our concept of what we might be evolving over time. I'm really excited to see how that theme plays out in future conversations with other guests. I love that each of these people is pointing to how they remain open. How they stay connected, how they keep growing. And they advocate so clearly for compassion and humility and relationships in ways that each of us can apply to our own lives. As I sat on my own kind of considering the threads that intertwine compassion, humility, and relationships, I remembered one of my favorite passages on compassion that is from a talk the Dalai Lama shared back in nineteen eighty nine. One of the most authentic things for me to do is to leverage things toward action. What am I going to do from here because of what I've learned? And this came back in my mind as a way that I could apply this and that maybe you'd appreciate. Tolerance and patience are extremely important for the balance of our mind. How do we practice them? Simply to think that they are noble principles is not enough. It's when we actually hit difficulties that the real opportunity to practice patience comes along. Who is it then that can create that kind of opportunity? Our enemy. In this sense, our enemy is like a teacher, one who is sincerely teaching us patience and tolerance. For a person who believes in the importance of compassion and love, the practice of patience and tolerance is essential. And the only factor that provides us with the opportunity to practice patience is our enemy. If we can only reflect along these lines, whatever strong negative attitude or ill feelings we have toward our enemy will naturally reduce. On the surface, altruism, compassion, and love seem to be actions associated with selflessness. But I feel that if we are truly selfish, then we will take care of other people, help other people, serve other people, be more concerned about others' welfare, make more friends and generate more smiles. Then we will find that when we need help there will be plenty of helpers. That statement just stands so well when we compare it with what nine people have shared so far on this podcast. The intertwining of help and helper, the openness to experience, the courage and humility it takes to look at an enemy and see someone who's providing us with the opportunity to grow. These are the things that I think most of us can really benefit from keeping in mind. I hope you'll share my appreciation for these nine people and how they shared so openly about their values, how they arose, where they continue to struggle, and what might life look like from here. I hope you'll agree that these conversations do matter. These are things that can benefit us providing clarity in times of uncertainty and ambiguity, creating a sense of resilience when things are difficult and the world seems to be asking things of us that we don't feel prepared to deliver. I want to thank you for exploring some of these themes with me on the first solo reflection episode of Because This Matters. And I hope that you share my same gratitude for each of these nine guests sharing so openly, vulnerably, and offering the clarity that they have for themselves, so that some of it might spark our own clarity along our way. If you'd like more information about me, you can visit markpoise.com. And if you think that these conversations are valuable, I encourage you to share them with others. Like, comment, subscribe, or share on your podcast platform of choice. or on YouTube. I truly appreciate all of your thoughts and feedback in the process, and I'm looking forward to bringing you a lot more. Until then, be well.