Such a wasted question: what would I have done different?
Because even when that list is completed, the comprehensive list of all the life-altering things I would have done different, the number of them I'll actually have a chance to do different is zero. Forever. Zero. But what would I have done better? Now there is a meaningful question. So often, when we consider different, we consider undoing. We think of all the things we did we wish we hadn't done until we are helplessly depressed by the reality there is NO undoing. But when we consider better, we think about doing. We can't undo our way to different but we can absolutely do ourselves to better. Better is the hopeful excitement that comes with the possibilities waiting on the other side of doing. Today is a perfect day to stop beating yourself up for the things you'd like to undo and start imagining the possibilities calling your name on the other side of doing. Start doing. Start answering the call. Lean into better; turn away from different. The list of things you can undo is forever zero. The list of things you can do better is forever endless. Forever hopeful.
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I met with a young lady yesterday who'd made a mistake. As we talked about the mistake, she was very quiet.
She'd answer my questions; yes sir, no sir. But there were few details. No desire to share any. There was little sign of life at all beneath the responses. I noticed though, as the questions kept coming and the answers got harder for her to give, that there were tears. They were small and contained, but the tears were there. I recognized them; I always do. I was done with my questions. All but one, that is. Can you tell me about those tears, I asked her. I knew the answer. I wasn't curious about her tears. I was curious if she knew what her tears were. She did. Because she said - the tears no longer contained - I'm just really mad at myself. What I did was stupid. I feel really dumb. I sat with that for a second, then told her, what you did wasn't really stupid, it was really human. Making mistakes is human, not dumb. Dumb is what we are prone to call ourselves at times when we are being human. Sometimes it's a really unfair accusation. It is always unhealthy. I told her every mistake precedes a choice. Do I beat myself up or pick myself up? I told her there are days, as someone about four decades more experienced with that choice than her, that I wish I could go back to my earliest days of that choice. Go back and choose pick myself up and not beat myself up. Because it's a critical choice we make, beat myself up or pick myself up. A life of beating oneself up looks remarkably different than one of picking oneself up. Remarkably different. She smiled. There was life. She began telling me about being an athlete and student. She began telling me what she dreamed about doing when she gets a little older. She told me about summer plans. There was excitement and there was hope. Because that's what happens when we start picking ourselves up and stop beating ourselves up. We give invitation to hope. I am thankful to know that. To have learned that. Because when we are sitting in a moment like that. When we share a moment with someone else's mistake. We have a choice, do I beat them up or pick them up. Only one of those answers gives birth to hope. If you are in the presence of someone today who has made a mistake, don't beat them up; they already have that angle covered. Ask them about their tears, and then remind them that mistakes are simply the precursor to a choice. Beat myself up or pick myself up. Then help them choose the hopeful response. It makes all the difference. I've come to believe the key to a meaningful relationship is being comfortable enough within the space of that relationship to let go.
Let go of shame. Let go of guilt. Let go of struggles. Let go of emotions. Let go of the stories we tell ourselves that are unkind to ourselves. All of these things we hold onto for fear of destroying ourselves and for fear of destroying a relationship are actually the things, that when shared, forge a connection. They are the things that turn a regular relationship into a meaningful relationship. Meaningful relationship: the sweet and precious home of no secrets. Secrets are toxic. They are like poison. They eat away at our cells and at our minds and at everything we thought we knew about who we are. Who we were. And the only antidote for that kind of poison is the safety and the freedom to share. To confess. To own. The only antidote is the invitation to be real and vulnerable. And when we can't find that, when we can't have that, it's not like we become suddenly at home with our secrets and with our struggles. Not at all. It's then that we give up on antidotes and simply turn to trying to drown poison with poison. Drown the poison of secrecy with substances or with our electronic devices or with our work or with food or with relationships that aren't safe places at all. Until we come to know that poison on top of poison is the worst kept secret of all. It is a death sentence; maybe it won't steal your breath, but it will steal your life. And thus begins the battle of letting go. The battle of letting go of things we never dreamt we'd turn to let alone struggle every day to turn away from. The battle of letting go of the seen because we never found a place to safely let go of the unseen. It's a cruel twist of fate, really, this seemingly insurmountable battle to let go of the toxins that grew out of a seemingly insurmountable fear of letting go of all the struggles that gave birth to them. A buddy shared this quote with me recently. “You can’t force cohesion or unity. It doesn’t come from trust falls, gimmicky, bonding activities, or forced interaction. It comes from being real - from allowing people to lower their defenses and feel comfortable enough to be who they are. You can’t force it. All you can do is create the space for it to happen." I fear we are building too many relationships on the gimmicky and not on spaces that allow people to feel comfortable enough to be who they are. The results of that can be toxic. They can leave us living a life of trying to let go of things we never would have had to let go of had we simply found a safe place to let go. Because that is the one thing we are all looking for to some degree. A safe place to let go. You're in charge of the story you tell.
The whole thing. So be kind to yourself. Even when the outcomes of your life aren't. Reframe your story as one that is on it's way to something beautiful. Because it can be. Because it is. When you tell the story of the outcomes that had to be on the way to the beauty you know you'll see. It's your story. Be kind to yourself when you tell it. I have been called a people person. Engaging. Funny. Charismatic. Today, I'd humbly accept that as truth. I'd also say that for most of my life it wasn't truth.
Most of my life people person wasn't who I was, it was what I did. Our personalities can be a superpower of sorts. They allow us to keep relationships above the surface. They are superpowers we develop along the way to allow us to hide in plain sight. Hide from connection. Hide from vulnerability. When a connection starts to get close to who you really are, the struggling and broken and hurting you, your personality superpower allows you to tell a great joke. Tell an engaging story. It allows you to smile a smile that says I've never had a struggle in my life. And the superpower almost always pushes back the invasion. The intrusion of someone closing in on the secrets your superpowers were developed to protect. I've been fortunate the last several years. Fortunate to have people come into my life who've made vulnerability feel more like safety than an invasion. Fortunate to recognize that some superpowers are superheroes trying to take you out disguised as superheroes trying to save your world. I tell you all of this not as a people person, but as a person worried about the number of people hiding in plain sight. I know firsthand how looking great is not always doing great. May is Mental Health Awareness Month. And I want to challenge us to check in on the people around us. I want to challenge us to ask, is that who someone is, or is that their superpower? If you have someone close to you, and they haven't talked about a struggle recently. If you haven't heard them talk about the challenges they are facing in life. If you haven't heard them disclose that life has tripped them up a bit lately, I'd be curious. Because life is hard for everyone. Struggle is all inclusive. And so I'd be curious, am I hanging out with my friend or my family member, or am I hanging out with a superpower. If you feel like it might be a superpower, I'd ask them. Lovingly. Are you OK? I'd say, "I know life gets hard sometimes. Mine sure does. And it's always good to have someone to talk to when it does. I just want you to know I'm here for you if your life ever gets hard like mine does." Vulnerability is an invitation not expectation. It is safety and not invasion. And I will tell you from personal experience, a personality superpower's greatest weakness is vulnerability. It is safety. It is the place where a superpower is given permission to stop being what someone does and become who they are. I am thankful for the superheroes who have come into my life and gifted me that transformation. It's a transformation that is a work in progress, but I'm no longer hiding. And my greatest desire in life is that you will no longer have to hide either. My greatest desire is that your personality will be who you are, not what you do. The scene preceded every shoe distribution. Kids waiting in line to have their foot measured for a new pair of shoes. Many of them had walked an hour or more to be in the line.
To wait for their chance. At shoes. It's really easy in those moments to think about the things I'm waiting on in my life. Almost all of them are things I can definitely live without. Almost all of them are personal preference and dream things. None of them make life risky to live without. Shoes are risky to live without. I'm at a conference today with several hundred people. All of them are wearing shoes. Many of them wearing shoes that are quite expensive. This isn't a guilt trip post. The reality is we are always going to live in a world of haves and have nots. This isn't about a great equalization. But it is about reflecting on some things the have nots should not have to have not. Shoes are one of those things. Especially when we have the means to make sure of that. This month you can help me. In May, Soles4Souls is hosting The Race 4 Every Kid. It's a race to raise money to provide new shoes to kids living in homelessness across the US. I will be running/walking a total of 100 miles this month in the race (first time in a LONG time I'll hit that milestone!). Along the way I am trying to raise $4,000 to support getting good shoes to homeless kids in the US. Thanks to my friend Tracey Outlaw I'm off to a great start. I'm grateful for Tracey and his constant support of the Soles4Souls mission. I'd be grateful to anyone who wants to contribute a little or a lot to carry on the momentum. Because again, there are just some things none of us should have to wait for. If you feel so led, you can contribute at this link: https://charity.pledgeit.org/f/lCeZc8mdMy And thank you a lot in advance for your support. One of the biggest dangers of being stuck in the past is we come to live in a place where life is always old.
Ancient. It's why we often stay there. Even if it's hard. Even if it's unhealthy. Because what is ancient and old is known. It is predictable. And our brains love predictable. Predictable feels safe. It feels secure. To move forward is to move into something new. The unknown. And nothing says run louder than the unknown. Esther de Waal says, "Insecurity makes certainty attractive, and it is in times like these that I want to harness God to my preferred scheme of things, for it is risky to be so vulnerable. Yet it is this vulnerability that asks for trust and hope in God’s plans, not mine." I spent a lot of my life with my hands over my eyes. Sometimes over my ears. I lived in fear of seeing or hearing something new. Something that would challenge me to become someone different than the me I'd settled into. A me I didn't often like but a me I could comfortably live with. Because it was the me I knew. These days my hands are more prone to be out in front of me. They are open. Open to possibility. Open to new. Open to the God who has always been calling me away from the ancient. To see the new that has often been blinded by the old. To find hope often buried inside the hopelessness. To discover that miracles aren't always the miraculous. Sometimes they are simply what wide open eyes find when they have the courage to move forward. I spent several days with 12 amazing humans in Honduras. My story now is theirs, and theirs mine. There are moments in the midst of that - in the midst of 12 strangers in a country a relatively small portion of the world will ever see - when I ask myself: How did I get here? It can get to feeling miraculous, really. As I hear the stories of how others came to be in that moment with me and all that they will take back with them. The layers of the stories are many; and they are all new. They are hope and possibility. There is nothing old about a moment like that. Nothing ancient. And as much as I truly believe God's hands are in a moment like that, it's important to see - so are my feet. The feet beneath me that walked out of the old and into the new. Hands open. Heart inviting. Vulnerability leading the way, not holding me hostage. The miraculous is there for us all. God's hands are waving us into it. Like a ground marshal calls a plane to the runway. Arms waving and directing us on. But we have to respond to the marshal. We have to move away from where we are parked to where we are called. We have to abandon the ancient to explore the new. We have to trust in the miracles that are waiting there. Because they ARE there. And they are beautiful. So move on. Hands open and ready for the new. On the final night of my trip to Honduras, our group was asked to reflect on the most meaningful moment of our trip. Hard as I tried, I couldn't come up with a moment.
Instead, it was a word that kept coming to mind. Over and over, as I lay on my bed trying to come up with the one moment, it was a word I kept hearing and not a moment I kept seeing. And that word was progress. I visited Honduras back in 2019 - nearly four years ago. And two really important things have made a lot of progress since then. Honduras. And me. I think what caught me off guard was just how much it felt like I was in Honduras to receive and not give this time around. Much of that because we received numerous acts of gratitude from the Honduran people. We spent two hours at one shoe distribution taking in a program the people had put together just to say thank you. This included flying proudly our American flag right next to their Honduran flag in their school yard. You could tell they'd spent weeks preparing for this chance to show us gracias. There was the little boy who hiked from his village to our lunch spot - no easy hike - carrying a pot of coffee he'd made and brought with him a single cup. His way of saying thank you for coming into my life. There was the number of Honduran people who said 'thank you' and not 'gracias' - as if they felt some longing to connect with our hearts as we struggled to translate the words that might pour into theirs. Several times during this trip I found myself receiving and not giving. Don't get me wrong; I received last time. Tremendously. But this time it felt like receiving was the purpose and not one of the outcomes. Certainly a lot of that was because parts of Honduras have come a long way the last four years. I always hesitate to say something like that for fear it minimizes just how far there is to go. But I think many Hondurans feel the progress. And it feels like gratitude. I know that because I too have made progress the last four years. It does feel like gratitude. I have also had to wonder in the aftermath of that reflection if I might have a heart more open to receiving these days than I did back then. Because make no mistake, a different person went to Honduras in 2023 than the one who went in 2019. My life looks nothing like it did back then. In 2019, I was approaching the end of a life that had felt like a constant battle. A battle with demons. A battle with shame and guilt. A battle with worthiness. A battle with relationships. In many ways Honduras 2019 was my white flag moment. My surrender. And maybe it's in surrender that we stumble upon discovery. The discovery of who we truly are and who we truly long to be. I have discovered in this great surrender that when we give up fighting the world we are much more open to receiving it. Hugs no longer feel forced; they feel like an embrace. Thank you doesn't feel like like words; it feels like gracias. Being human no longer feels like an eternal and hopeless battle with one's self, but a beautiful chance to struggle together. Because that is where hope is: together. That is where thank you and gracias are: together. That is where progress leads: together. I'm forever thankful for my 2023 Honduras adventure and the beautiful people I shared it with: together. And I am forever in love with the people of Honduras. I've been there twice now, but it will forever feel like they came to me. At just the right time. Progress. Together. 5/1/2023 0 Comments We are All journeying togetherI'd made it through customs in Honduras and was waiting on two new friends from Florida to come through. I thought they might need help with their luggage. Little did I know they'd need a Honduran army to help them with their luggage!😲
When I first saw their collection of large suitcases, I was worried that I somehow had signed up to move to Honduras and not visit. And that I was significantly under packed for the move. It turns out they weren't moving but had suitcases full of items they'd collected and bought back home to bring to the kids. Toothbrushes and balls and socks and toys and just stuff to give to the kids they don't receive every day. It was incredibly generous and kind. I was happy to serve as a makeshift moving van. At each of the four shoe distributions a suitcase full of offerings many of the team members had brought along was handed out. After each child received their shoes, they moved on to the toy table. The toy table was a huge attraction. So were the empty suitcases. My friends decided they wanted to leave the suitcases behind for the community. (I was a bit grateful there weren't plans to load them with souvenirs that would then need to be transported to their plane on their return trip home 🤷♂️). On the last visit a young girl was staring at one of the suitcases. You could tell she desired it. My friend told her she could have it. On the suitcase were two ribbons. One blue and one pink. They were my friend's daughters' favorite colors. I could tell there were a lot of memories attached to that suitcase. Quite literally attached. The little girl opened her new suitcase. Something about the way she opened it, with care and appreciation, told me it might be the most beautiful gift she'd ever received. She went about cleaning out some of the trash inside it, and once it was as beautiful as she longed for it to be, she zipped it back up and rolled it away. I saw her stop by her mother. She put the suitcase back down and opened it back up. Then she took a bag from her mother's hands and placed it inside the suitcase. Almost as if packing for a trip. Then she zipped it back up. Rolled it away. She was smiling. I don't know if the smile was because she was helping out her mother. Or if it was because she was dreaming of a family vacation. Or if she suddenly felt like a normal girl with a normal set of luggage. But that suitcase opened something in her. Unlocked something maybe. As we were leaving the location, climbing a steep dirt road, out the van window we could see the girl pulling her suitcase up the hill. As we passed by she looked and waved and smiled. I wonder if she felt like we were all traveling together now. Like we were all on a shared journey. We do that for one another when we share our gifts. Whether tangible gifts or the gifts of our spirit. We connect to one another in very real ways. I think it's important when we do to trace that connection. Trace it back to the memories of the family vacations that suitcase rolled along on. Trace it back to the pink ribbon and the blue one. Connect the memories of the past with the dreams of the future and the memories to come. Even if it's a family vacation walking up a dirt road; in that child's imagination it was a beautiful vacation. It's a forever memory with its own ribbon color. We too often miss out on knowing how beautiful this journey is we are all taking together when we fail to stop and honor the connection. Because a suitcase is not just a suitcase when it's a part of the journey. It is the journey. It is pink and blue and it is all colors. Because we are all on a shared journey. We just don't often enough take time to recognize it. |
Robert "Keith" CartwrightI am a friend of God, a dad, a runner who never wins, but is always searching for beauty in the race. Archives
May 2024
CategoriesAll Faith Fatherhood Life Mental Health Perserverance Running |