I am currently in the midst of a lengthy process to become a member at our church. For those that are not church-goers or attend one of those new-fangled churches that think membership is only for CostCo and the occult, I believe being a member of a church is a really positive thing. In my opinion it shows a profound understanding of the interdependence of humanity and our ancient need to commit to a people and place.

So I deeply believe in church membership, but I’m thinking about quitting our church’s process.

My exploration of membership began when my wife and I were talking about baptizing our infant son. At our church, in order for an infant to be baptized, their parents must be members. I decided against pointing out the story in which an Ethiopian Eunich (a sexually ambiguous someone) was baptized by Phillip at the very sight of water. God forbid my son casually drive by the pacific ocean with a member of our church and ask to be baptized – they’d point him to a stack of paper work.

I am in the midst of a 5-page document comprised of check boxes and essay questions. I don’t mind essay questions, but these are getting absurd. I am more than happy to talk how my faith has been a source of strength throughout my youth and adult years. That seems relevant. But then you ask about a “life experience” that has shaped who I am. First of all, am I writing a memoir or trying to get my baby baptized? Secondly, how much time do you have? And then you ask me “Where do you want to serve?” Prison ministry? Underserved youth? You know what I really want to serve? I want to serve margaritas on Cinco De Mayo. Comprehende? Frustrated by this membership process, I quit.

Soon after setting down the membership application, I began to feel like a hypocrite. As a consultant, many of our clients get the same “process fatigue” I had. But rather than pouting like me, I urge them to take the process seriously. Executives generally don’t enjoy seeing a consultant in their halls to begin with, but when we ask them to fill in a few blanks of a template document that’s content they seem to understand intuitively, their expensive blood begins to boil. They see the processes we invite them to as hoops and hurdles to overcome rather than being of any assistance.

But I beg our clients to see the importance of slowing down, thinking through each question, and choosing good language. Why? Because I believe that good process adds more value than good ideas.

We see it all around us. A good coffee bean is crap if you burn it with water over 200 degrees. A good plant will die without proper pruning and watering. A great business idea will fail if its leaders don’t systemize their successes. The most intelligent and attractive couples will divorce if they don’t routinely discuss the quality of their relationship. We cannot rely on the quality of an idea, or an ingredient, or past success. If something is important to us, we should have a thoughtful process for it.

Oh. Ok, I get it. So my church wants me to take membership seriously because it is important to them. They are showing intention and inviting me to the same. They want me to slow down. They want me to think about it. Feel about it.  Sure it is mundane, too thorough, and long. But what could be better for something important? Just ask a mother of 10 pound twins. Would she have liked the process to be shorter and less uncomfortable? You bet. Would a shorter pregnancy have impacted the babies’ health? Likely.

We tire of process quickly because we naturally want resolution. We want the outcome without the bumps and bruises of the hard work. We want the product without the process. But we must come to see that while we cannot always control the outcome, we are in control of the quality of the process.  And that the process is where the real value is added and amazing outcomes made.

I am certain that one day my son will ask me, “Dad, why didn’t you have me baptized as an infant?” And rather than having a sophisticated theological answer I will tell him it was because of the paper work and the process fatigue. And he will judge me, call me a wimp, and say that I should have tried harder. I hope.

For work I am often out of town three nights at a time. I am staying in whatever hotel can give me the most reward points, I have plenty of email to catch up on in the evening hours, and I often do dinner or drinks with colleagues. No time for much of anything else. For those three days I’m on a work sprint. Then I return home to my wife and 9 month old. I’m exhausted mentally and physically (flying American Airlines and eating Cinnabon twice in three days is worse for your body than smoking). Taryn and I have a lot to catch up on but also have to manage life’s details. Did you order more baby formula online? Get a baby sitter for next Saturday? Did you notice that our garage door doesn’t work, our windows are leaking, and the neighborhood cat chewed through your bike tires? Another sprint.

I even schedule my social life in sprints. This week I have scheduled time with five different friends on five different days. Each is scheduled for 60 minutes. I have not seen these people in over a month but I think we are going to connect in the same amount of time it takes to tell the story of a whole week in the life the Kardashains? Silly.

One can imagine that hundreds of years ago the question “how long will it take to get to the beach?” was one about how far your two feet could take you. Or maybe they measured things in buffalo lengths. I don’t know. But now it comes with options and all of those options are about speed. How long will it take to get to the beach? Depends – are you taking your bike? Bus? Car? In the last 100 years vehicles were created that could move us faster and more efficiently than our feet or a couple of ponies could ever do. At one point progress was about Lindbergh flying over the Atlantic or simply stepping foot on the moon. Now it is about how fast we can do that.

We are in an era of sprint. Our work, our play, our intimacy, our phone calls, trips, spiritual rhythms, diets, marriages, are all done as periods of sprint. Some people believe this is the inevitable impact of technology. Others believe it is the devil. The conversation is bipolar. Move to Asheville, NC and have a farm and just chiiiiiiiill. Or get used to this pace because time is all we have! And time is money! Read The Four Hour Work Week!

It’s both. We are people living in time, with limited amounts of it. And we must live it well.

Author and Pastor Eugene Peterson says

“We are embedded in time, but time is also embedded in us. Creation is called into being, not haphazardly and not in a cacophony of noise but rhythmically.”

We have seconds, minutes, and hours. We have days, weeks, and seasons. Does our era of sprint ignore this? Should I just move to the Sonoma Coast, take daily naps, and drink Hirch Vineyard’s Pinot Noir each night? Peterson again,

Time is the medium in which we do all our living. When time is desecrated, life is desecrated. The most conspicuous evidences of this desecration are hurry and procrastination. Hurry turns away from the gift of time in a compulsive grasping for abstractions that it can possess and control. Procrastination is distracted from the gift of time in a lazy inattentiveness to the life of obedience and adoration by which we enter the “fullness of time.” Whether by a hurried grasping or by a procrastinating inattention, time is violated.

In an Era of Sprint we must remember that efficiency often withdraws presence. But we must not respond by retreating into laziness or isolation thinking that will enrich us. Time is a gift. Gifts are not managed, controlled, or made efficient. Gifts are received.

Each day is an opportunity to receive and participate in the rhythms given to us by our Creator. It is as we listen to these rhythms that we find the pace for our own life. So today, how will we receive our time? I’m not sure how I will receive it, but I better do it quick!!

I am of the opinion that red wine is for any meal, white wine is for cooking, and champagne is only for celebrating. When I have a glass of champagne in my hand I want to be laughing, hugging, and dancing – all with people in sequins. I can only recall one such time when this was not the case and I am certainly to blame.

My dear friend had just gotten engaged and a handsome herd us met to celebrate in the bar area of a high-ceilinged restaurant. The bar was louder than a middle school girl’s sleepover, but you could still hear the pop of each champagne cork. After a group toast or two, I cornered my newly engaged friend (my social awkwardness ensures I do this at all large social functions) to have a meaningful conversation about his monogamous future. After a smile and another hug I asked him “So! How might this thing end in divorce?”

He rightfully, took my sparkling rosé, set it on the bar, leaned in and whispered in my ear “You are a mad man. Please leave.”

While it may have been slightly inappropriate to ask him this just hours after his proposal, I had good intentions. It was a thought experiment. I was asking him to consider all of the possible paths to failure. Why? Because in my experience (of my own marriage and those in my family), you can’t predict how the future you or the future anyone else will behave and you certainly cannot predict how those behaviors will impact you. Why didn’t he see that that’s what I was after? So sensitive!

So if marriage (like investing, parenting, teaching, leading, oh and, LIFE), at least in my opinion, is so unpredictable, what are we to do? Pre-marital counseling? Compatibility tests? Live together first to make sure that she always smells that good? Those are all good risk mitigation tactics but mounting evidence says that those don’t work.

In my mind that leaves us one option – to create a more whole, centered, loving self that is prepared for the certainty of life’s unpredictability. And there is one thing that is guaranteed to screw that self-strengthening-process up: defensiveness.

Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist, famously described human behavior as a collaboration between an elephant and a rider – the division between conscious/reasoned processes and automatic/implicit processes. Haidt claims that rather than taking charge, the over matched rider tends to lean with the direction of the elephant and begins to logically defend the decision that was actually made by the automatic/implicit process. In other words our behavior is often un-rational (even to our own self) but we try to explain it so that it seems rational.

Why? For me it is because admitting that the elephant is in charge is scary. Admitting that all of my decisions are not thought out, well informed, and their outcomes controllable is frightening. And this feeling that the unpredictable elephant is an antagonist that we must protect ourselves from is a driving force for our nation’s baseline anxiety (despite being the richest nation on earth, the United States is, according to the World Health Organization, by a wide margin also the most anxious, with nearly a third of Americans likely to suffer from an anxiety problem in their lifetime). But this anxiety and our need for a predictable and controlled future may actually be robbing us of the attributes we need to withstand life’s unpredictability.

Right now, drop what you are doing, and put your hands up like you are about to be smacked in the face. Things just got real on this blog post! Like a boxer or a hillbilly in a bar fight – put your dukes up. Now with your hands in that same position I want you to imagine someone throwing you a large, expensive and very fragile vase. But don’t put your hands down! You might get smacked in the mouth! Continue to defend yourself and try to catch the vase! Not easy work, eh? If someone wants to try this and put the video on the internet, I wouldn’t mind.

Defensiveness is active. We get hyper focused on the perceived harm. Then we tense up and go to war with that harm. When we are defensive of ourselves (others, ideas, companies, cities, political parties), it is difficult to receive much of anything.

In my faith tradition there is a verse that says by His divine power, not our own, God has given us everything we need to experience a rich life. There are numerous Buddhist sayings that reinforce that wisdom is something received rather than struggled for. In his book, Antifragile, Nassim Nicholas Taleb agrees with this idea saying that all things that have life in them are “anti-fragile.” “Antifragile” is his phrase for things that naturally get stronger when experiencing pain or volatility. He believes that humans were created to thrive in changing unpredictability. But he says that many of us today “suppress harm and volatility” and thus create countries, organizations, and families vulnerable to catastrophe. In other words, by not receiving the way in which we have been created, and instead defending ourselves from life’s unpredictaibilities, we are increasing our fragility.

As a pastor (former in roll, current in duties) I have the privilege of standing with individuals as they commit to a lifetime of love. I also have the privilege of doing pre-marital counseling and seeing how hard they are willing to work for a thriving marriage. In my premarital counseling I often ask the happy couple to “blow it up.” I invite them to imagine chaos, trauma, and worse case scenario. I ask them the question I asked my champagne sipping friend.

We should ask ourselves more of these questions. How can we allow ourselves to feel the fear of failure, hardship, and pain (while understanding that many, because of the intensity of it, don’t get a choice to not feel those things)? The antifragile feel the uncertainty and know it is inevitable. We cannot realistically predict our future behavior or the behavior of those we relate with. Change, variance, and our unknowing are guaranteed.

But also guaranteed is our ability to survive – even thrive – in the face of this unpredictability. If only we could receive how we have been made. Receive the complexity and the mystery of our resilience. With gratitude. And toast a glass of champagne to that.

Forget rats, I’d like to do psychological research on people that attend networking events. First there’s the smiley girl that asks you (and everyone else) if she can get you a drink. Then that guy that is still wearing his Google employee badge – we got it hot shot. Also the unemployed, overdressed gentleman who is standing by the chip bowl handing out napkins and introducing himself as a “freelance consultant.” Finally there is the guy hunched over in the corner, making no eye contact, pounding a $6 merlot, and shoveling cheese dip into his mouth. That’s me.

I hate networking events. Although I am proud of my current work positions (which are much more solidified than 18 months ago), I respond to the “what do you do?” question from a place of deep insecurity. Over compensating I speak with a grandiosity that would make Kanye West blush.

I consult for Fortune 500 companies by revolutionizing their processes and strategies while simultaneously changing the fundamental way that they do business and making real sure that the way they lead exceeds everyone’s expectations, oh, oh, and I also work with social enterprises and world changing Millennials and impact investors who are looking to really change the world from the inside out without any exceptions all the way until it’s the best forever and ever, like, forever, the best. That’s what I live for, like, deeply. What do you do?

I’m embarrassed because that was a direct quote.

Why do I respond that way? Because among my peers here in San Francisco, that is what is valued. If you are working your ass off as a mechanic, you are going to get a polite smile and next thing you know you are “sipping” your “second” Merlot by yourself. People value size, progressiveness, and world change so I bolster my bio to fit the expectations.

Even as I type, the words of a self help book enter my mind “Jarrod, there is no need to puff your self up. You are the one who gets to decide what real success is. Define it for yourself!” Unfortunately, value is socially constructed. That Oprah like voice is a lie. I believe that value is the extent to which a society, group, or family holds something to be important. In other words, all value is social.

For example, do you understand why a dollar is worth what it is? Right now in your pocket, do you have a dollar? Probably not. You have a debit card though? What is that worth? The raw materials are worth less than 1/50 of 1 cent. But that card is linked to your bank. But does the bank have your dollars? And what is a dollar? Paper? Why is that worth anything? In the 7^th century the coin was worth its weight in the metal it was minted in. But today, currency is a symbol. The dollar, pound, yen, and peso are socially standardized measures of value.

I am not a historian or an economist, and my concern is not the standardization currency. My concern is that we are also standardizing our definition of success. There is a socially standardized expectation that we should grow fast, be increasingly profitable, and ignore those that say otherwise. We should change the world, challenge the status quo, and make a big splash! We need higher test scores, bigger congregations, more downloads, twice as many unique visits, a bigger building, more patients cared for – the list is too easy to create.

I am all for measuring success as long as we understand – what I am trying to come to terms with in my own work – that all things were not created equal. A professor of Biochemistry at Colombia University says “there is a proper size to everything in the world. We have lost entirely this sense of measure.” If there is a proper size to everything then we cannot have one, universal, standardized measure for success.  Consider this an ecological and anthropological truth. The Caryota palm tree can exceed 90 feet tall while a Serenoa Palm will never grow beyond 10. Were they both successful in growing? Yes. Can they rely on height as the metric for success? No.

But plants don’t have performance-based incentives, weekly calls with their investors, or report to the CEO. For us it can be quite exhausting, disheartening, and anxiety producing to be a part of industries, organizations, and even families that abide by this standard of success. The words of author Nassim Taleb (please check out Antifragile) ring true for me in this regard,

“Missing a train is only painful if you run after it! Likewise, not matching the idea of success others expect from you is only painful if that’s what you are seeking.”

I’m tired of running after it. You?

So perhaps the self help folks are correct and we do all need to take time to define success for ourselves. Or at the very least, slow down and realize that the definition of success we are after may be the culturally informed, standardized variety. Knowing how we measure success allows us to distinguish what is important to us and thus provides much needed guidance for what should be pursued as opposed to what could be pursued.

I am still not exactly sure of my proper size, shape, and contribution to the world, but I am beginning to feel the freedom that can come with this mindshift. If we all embraced this idea, maybe the envious job comparison will end, greed will cease, and the sleepless nights discontinue! And think about this…NO MORE NETWORKING EVENTS! WE WILL NEVER DRINK MERLOT AGAIN!

Like a colorful pocket square on a tweed-suited salesman, the only pop of color along our Phoenix track home was the bright bougainvillea. If you have ever been to Arizona you have most certainly seen them lining the walls of retirement homes and master planned communities. There they are as common as golf shirts.

These bougainvillea varieties have pink or white flowers, thick and thorny stems, and are very common in warm climates. In our yard these bougainvillea grew like weeds. Out of the dessert soil or a crack in the adobe wall, out would pop this beautiful windy plant. It’s aggressive growing makes it a logical plant to use in landscaping, but how you contain its growth makes all the difference. Without any pruning this vine can leap up buildings like a rock climber, using its waxy thorns as pins and pitons.

For many years it was my chore to contain this pretty pink beast. While I am a man of great height, strength, and courage today (reader chuckles to themselves) as a child I was a bit more timid around ladders and didn’t do dirt. Needless to say that the 30 foot, thorny, vine creature was not something that I was very good at slaying.

Growing weary of my inability to tame the plant, I wondered if there was a way to outsmart it. Just like man – always trying to outwit the created order. To limit its height, I realized that I needed to move it away from the wall but also knew I must keep it alive because my mom loved it. So what if I just dug it up, potted it, and moved it a few feet from the fence? With a sweaty Tommy Hilfiger polo and some dirt under my nails, my experiment was complete. One potted bougainvillea.

What my experiment quickly taught me is that if you put the same plant in a different container, it reacts. This bougainvillea became sensitive. It dried out quickly. Its vines flopped over like wet noodles. The plant no longer grew up but out. It was now much easier to hedge. I GOT YOU, YOU DUMB PLANT!

The earth tells us that conditions matters. Temperature, the amount of water, how much wind, and in this case, what container something is in all have an impact on how something grows. It wasn’t that the bougainvillea stopped growing when moved to the pot, it was that it grew differently as a result of where it was hosted. This appears to be an ecological truth that we humans struggle with.

We live in the age of the guru. Right now your twitter feed has posts that read three ways to improve your team’s performance. The nine secrets to a better night’s sleep. Seven principals on the five steps to receive the three keys to greatness. I’ve always wanted to be one of these gurus – an expert in a specific field or a know it all – because gurus make them dolla bills! Why? Because in the age of the guru everyone is looking for clean, quick, answers.

But this kind of advice is like two Tylenol capsules for chronic back pain. We rely on guru-nic, simple, operational information when what we really have are transformational needs. Our chronic back issue needs physical therapy, one of those rolly styrofoam things, and $300 shoes with custom arch support.

Different learning needs require different learning contexts. If you turn to conferences, one off podcasts, Sunday’s sermon, and guru’s top ten lists you will grow accordingly. The fruit you bare will be trendy, temporary, and marginally helpful.  But I’m not sure this is what we want. This is not what I want.

I want transformation. I want to transform the way I use and view my money. I want to transform the way I parent. I want to transform my relationships. I want to transform how I work. I want to transform my prayer life. None of these things are easy. None of them are a quick solve. I (maybe you too) need transformation and therefore need transformational contexts.

We cannot assume that all plants will grow the same regardless of where they are placed.  I don’t believe we can pot ourselves in the soil of gurus and expect transformation. We cannot build gurueque soils and expect lives to be transformed. So what then is a transformational context?

I don’t really know. And to say I did would be pretty guru-otic, eh? Here are some qualities that I can identify, but I would love to hear your input.

Differentiated Encounters– It’s hard to be transformed while sitting on your couch. It’s too familiar and too pillowy. When we go to a new place, meet new people, or try new things the possibility of transformation begins.

Practiced – My friend Mark says that if we want to transform we should leave the lecture hall and get into the dojo. To me, this is the difference between taking in guru knowledge and developing a deep understanding. Understanding comes as we practice, reflect, improve, practice, etc. It’s risky. It’s hard. It’s rarely fun.

With Others – We are more likely to transform if others are committed with us. That hard work of practice, failure, and learning cannot be done along. I would also add that having a guide, coach, or mentor with expertise is also essential to good transformation of self.

I see lots of gurus and I’m green with envy toward their “success.” But because of my own experience with the quick hitting, short lived advice, I question their results – the strength of their roots and if they will last through the winter. Where we are planted matters. I want to plant well and differently (this is an ache of mine as you can tell by the many similar posts I have written) but am still discerning how to best do that. Maybe I need a new pot.

My marriage has provided me with a number of immaterial blessings –an introduction to the rich stories found in the ballet, a bigger heart for the oppressed, and an appreciation for Destiny Child’s back catalog. My favorite material blessing is a cabin named Bear Claw. Located in the White Mountains of Eastern Arizona and owned by my in laws, this massive log cabin demands that you nap, write, and repeat. A massive wildfire threatened to take this cottage refuge away forever.

Every fire season in the western United States, we see on television the images of 100-foot flames spreading through tree crowns, while grim-faced news anchors report how many acres of forest was destroyed by the latest catastrophic fire.  Our distressed reaction is understandable as many homes and lives can be lost. Thank God then for hunky firefighters and the US Forest Service.

In 1905 the US Government adopted a “total fire suppression” policy and this was institutionalized by the creation of the United States Forest Department. This department and their coordinated government efforts (those helicopters that pee on stuff) is what saved my beloved Bear Claw from being destroyed. This fire suppression appexed in 1935, when the Forest Service implemented a “10 a.m. policy” which stipulated that a fire was to be contained and controlled by 10 a.m. the morning after the fire was initially spotted. See fire? Smell smoke? Get rid of it. This era was also iconized by the now 68-year-old Smokey the Bear who continues to be a pop-culture figure. Haven’t heard from him recently? Follow him on Twitter. Really.

But while the total number of fires is much lower than the early 1900s, the number of wildfires has sky rocketed (there are seven times as many today). Could there be correlation between fire suppression and the rise in wildfires?

Under ideal and controlled conditions, forest fires are beneficial.  Well before ol’ Smoky started tweeting, fire was a frequent visitor. Lightning struck and created flame. The heat revved up resin flow in bigger trees making them stronger, thicker, and more resilient. Fire cleared dead wood from the forest floor and allowed the life-giving rays to reach their roots. The ash added nutrients to the soil. Many species, including oak and pine, actually require the work of fire to initiate the blooming of the seedlings. Fire was not an ecosystem option. It was required for its health.

Today the massive wildfires claim millions of acres of land and burn at an intensity and temperature that is often too hot to leave behind the post-burn benefits those ecosystems are accustomed to. Like coffee that is too hot to drink, fire that exceeds its natural temperature just hurts things.

Fire suppression is good intentioned but is it possible that the effects of the government’s long-standing policy have done more harm than good?

Consider for a moment, not the forest ecosystem but our own selves. All of us experience catastrophic flame ups in our relationships, careers, spiritual lives, and inner selves. These flame ups claim the wellbeing of our families, friends, and psyche. They leave behind ruins that we struggle to make sense of. But could this be because we have done such a good job suppressing life’s natural blazes? That like the government’s plan of total fire suppression, we have starved our self-systems of the benefits of regular, natural fire?

In today’s world we buy things (The most likely customer of a self-help book is a person who has bought another self-help book in the last 18 months), get prescriptions, and avoid conversations so that we “overcome” the feelings of fear, pain, and worry. I am not sure that this avoidance is good. I understand that these are not enjoyable feelings, but they are inevitable and are the textures that give life its depth. Worry and avoidance do not help us skip over life’s hardships; it prohibits us from the benefits that such hardship bring.

It’s not whether or not forests will burn, but how. It is not a question of whether chaos, loss, and hardship will enter your life, but when. We can either involuntarily experience the destruction of wildfires, or we can embrace life’s natural flame and allow its benefits to seep deep into our lives.

So how do we set fire to some stuff now? How do we prevent wild fires? For starters I’d buy one of those crème brule torches.

I’m still trying to define what a “control burn” may look like for my life, but for starters I like this advice from Richard Rohr. He says,

“Do not waste any more moments of time lamenting poor parenting, lost jobs, failed relationships, physical handicaps, gender identity, economic poverty, or even the tragedy of any kind of abuse. Pain is part of the deal.”

Rohr is not talking about ignoring suffering. He is not talking about overlooking your unjust childhood or staying mute about the sadness you feel as you are unable to conceive. He is saying that there is goodness in the fire. That where there is flame there will be ash. Where there is ash there is nutrients for the soil. And where there is fertile soil there is a chance for new life.

While fires do leave behind acres of charred barren land, focus on the Coastal Redwoods of Muir Woods. See the tall Maple and the Tanoak of the Oregon coast. Listen to the Colorado wind blow through the Quaking Aspen’s dime sized leaves. Breath in the birch, pine, and juniper of the White Mountains. And remember that all the death that ever was or will be is nothing when sat next to life.

Most recipes ask that you raise a liquid to a boil and then allow it to simmer. But at two months old, my baby boy did the opposite. Calmly playing with the Tree Top Gang or having tummy time, suddenly Benton would roll over, look me in the eyes, spit out his pacifier and scream like a pre-teen in a haunted house. Calmly, I would lift him off the ground and begin going through the sequence. First “the elevator” – my right hand under his butt and my left supporting his neck as I quickly go up and then slowly down. Then the “yellow submarine” – a series of shooshes and bounces. Then finally the “kukukaroo.” Don’t ask.

After 10 minutes the scream remains. His voice is getting louder. My voice gets louder. Shhhh. Shhhhhhhhh. SHHHHHHHH!

My grip gets tighter. First on his leg, and then on his back, and then against my body like a running back protecting the ball as he races through the line of scrimmage.

The swinging gets faster. Left and right. Up and down. Faster. Faster.

My wife walks in the room.

I stop. I notice that I am warm. And sweating. I feel angry. But how could I direct anger at a pillow size mammal that just days before was cozy and warm sitting in a small, dark, whirlpool? How could I get mad at someone who has no control of his bowels and gets swaddled like a mad man?

Am I actually angry at my child? If given a moment, my rational mind can identify that I am not angry at my chrome-homey. But it is not my rational mind that responds in those moments. It is my elephant (as Jonathan Haidt describes it), my unconscious intuitive mind responding to something much deeper than the decibels of my child’s scream.

Psychologist Melanie Klein, who is most famous for her love of the breast, helped me understand my response to Benton’s tantrums. Klein (agreeing with Freud) believes that as we attach to a “good object” (such as the “breast” or more personally a sense of control, an important relationship, or self-made wealth) its loss can result in deep feelings of futility. Futility feels a lot like a cocktail of anger and exhaustion. It’s when you have done all that you can do but do not receive the results you want.

Feelings of futility are a normal psychological response to loss of anything that we love. But then what? According to Klein it’s a lot like that 5’2” guy driving the lifted, diesel truck with the muffler removed (who we assume is lacking under his hood). Our feelings of futility cause us to react with a “sense of omnipotence.” Instead of taking appropriate action to address the problems at hand when something changes (people are sad, logistics get difficult, you have increased anxiety) we respond by needing to prove our superiority. We respond with aggressiveness rather than tenderness.

Unfortunately, this is what happened as I tried to calm my son. I had lost my feeling of control (not to mention my sleep) and when I felt like I had nothing to solve his problem, futility took over, and aggression arrived.

You can think about this on the personal level (my aggression toward my son, the increase in conflict with your wife when you get a $5,000 tax bill you didn’t expect, or your 70 hour work week that you are committed to after your last business failed), the societal level (think about the U.S. response to the September 11^th attacks), and the organizational level (CEOs and Senior Executives who defend “the way its always been”, random firings during seasons of poor performance). Regardless we cannot control for the loss of all things good. Didn’t we learn this when our first goldfish died? And we cannot expect to appropriately manage our emotions at all times (medication won’t do the trick, either). But we can work to make sure that our feelings of futility do not turn into violence and misguided attempts to overcome and defeat. We can work to ensure that our anxiety does not lead to irrational self-protectionist behavior.

How?

For me it started when my wife read my journal. My floury notebook has a lock and key. Not really, it’s a word doc. And because we share a computer she often logs on and sees my most recent entry. In this case, she read about my feelings of futility, my confusion about why I could not calm my son, my frustration with myself, and my and my desire to get better at it.

After reading my words she said, “you are a great Father. Your honesty will be a gift to your son as he grows up.”

The futility and shame that I felt disappeared faster than then my baby’s screams arrived. Naming my feelings of futility and sharing them with someone else eased my desire to overcome or defeat my futility and opened me up to my tender fears of fatherhood. Rather than responding to my futility with aggression, I could now allow myself to feel that I was not an all powerful know it all and extend kindness to myself. And kindness to yourself and others seems to be the cure for most everything.

It is likely that you’ve tried to get the girl, land the perfect job, or raise the perfect child. It likely that you have simultaneously sought career advancement, spiritual formation, and marital bliss. My hunch is that you soon felt futile. That in spite of all of your efforts, you realized you were not as in control as you wished. You may respond with violence (or forfeiture)…that’s ok. You’re normal.  We’re not mad at our children, your spouse, your boss, or even our politicians. We are mad that the world isn’t right. We are mad that bad things happen that we cannot stop. We are mad that we cannot will the goodness we desire.

I have learned that when I feel this way, I need grace (or someone to give me the “kukukaroo”). And grace tastes like a glass of wine and sounds like the judgment free words of my wife.  May we all have the courage to admit (or be caught in) our futility and may we all be safe places for shame and futility to be shared.

A friend of mine describes San Francisco as a town where you have brunch every Saturday with someone you will only see twice a year. This resonates with me. Multiple mornings each week I scarf scones and single origin espressos while catching up with friends whose company I greatly enjoy. The problem is that I see these individuals less than I see my dentist and as a result we spend our 60 minutes just playing catch up.

[8:10a] Hey! How was Christmas? You went home for, like, a week right? Parents! I know, right! And how was your 80’s themed New Years fete? Madonna! I know, right! Rad.

[8:22a] So what’s new with you? You dated a dud? Started a cooking blog? Are planning a camping trip?

[8:47] Last time we got together you had a job interview? How did that go? Oh. You didn’t get it. You’ve applied for three more since then? Oh. You didn’t get those? Oh.

The banter is getting good but time has disappeared as quickly as the cappuccino.

As we get up from our seats, the time together always ends with the same words: “We should do this more.”

But we won’t.

And I think my son and his mother are teaching me why.

To a new father breast feeding is fascinating. That makes it sound like I stare. I don’t stare. Recently, my wife was feeding our six-month-old son and I caught her with a tear on her cheek. Breast feeding + crying = VERY fascinating. I asked her what was wrong. She began to describe the difficulty in watching our son evolve. After his arrival, her upper body was all that he wanted. But in a very short period of time he has grown to love solids and gets his daily supply of breast milk from bottles. He is growing up. For my wife it is difficult to love her son as his needs for her change. But her task remains the same, love him as he is.

Philosopher Simon Weil describes the love of a mother to her child as “attentive love.” Weil describes it as love in relation to the slow and progressive life of a child, only revealed to the “patient eye.” In other words the love of a mother should be steady and evolving with each cry, developmental milestone, and hue of poop. However, many mothers (company founders, church planters, and artists) cling to their children in specific stages. For example, it would be quite easy for a mother to idealize and cling to moments of self-sacrifice (such as breast feeding or carrying the child before they were mobile). Or for a company founder to elevate her back-of-the-napkin vision for the company as the truest form of her company’s mission. It is easier to love a fixed object or a characteristic of an object than it is to love the mystery of something or someone. It is difficult to love a child, company, or idea as it evolves.

Which returns me to my coffee dates. If we spend all of our time catching up than I hold onto a static image. You are a person with a job interview and a travel blog. You are a list of hobbies and events. I know about your Saturday night plans but I know nothing of your soul. I know nothing about the smoldering below the surface anxiety regarding your job interview. I can only guess about your entrepreneurial enthusiasm. I have no idea how to love you as your hopes and fears evolve daily because I don’t know what they are. But I believe that you and I, even after we stop defecating in our britches, still desire to receive and want to give this “patient eye” of attentive love.

So why do we settle for something less?

I don’t believe it’s for lack of desire, but for lack of courage.

Theologian Jurgen Moltmann – giving advice to CEOs, husbands, mothers, and friends – puts it this way…

“Part of love is friendship, which knows how to combine affection with respect for the other person’s liberty. That means respect for the mystery of the other, and his or her still latent and unrealized potentialities. If love stops, we make a fixed image of each other. We judge and pin each other down. That is death. But love liberates us from these images and keeps the future open for the other person. We have hope for each other, so we will wait with one another for the realization of that hope.”

Moltmann points out three things that I believe are action items for relational courage…

1)    Respect Difference: Unfortunately my pithy tweets and blog posts have not convinced the world (or my wife) to agree with me on everything. Diversity in opinion, life style, political position, and religion are here to stay. In our world of difference it is a courageous act to offer dignity. A common problem in today’s relationships (especially marriage) is less that people don’t come together, but that people do not retain their individuality and respect for one another’s difference. It is easy to take someone’s dignity away but hard work to give it. It takes great courage to humbly listen and even invite difference – rather than judging it as wrong and eliminating it.

2)    Accept our unknown futures: Friendships (especially romantic ones) often form because of shared passions and behaviors. But according to Moltmann we must remain open to those things changing and love that possibility? Oof. I think the point for me is that love is a commitment to the core of someone, not their behaviors. The same could be said for leading a team or organization. As a leader, you have no real idea what people will collaborate to make. Can you love them all the same and stay committed regardless of whether it looks like what you thought it would/should? And also, we are foolish if we think we know what our future selves will want. We don’t. We will change too. Thus standing with each other in the thrill and ambivalence of life’s unknowns takes courage.

3)    Exercise patience: “…so we will wait with each other,” Moltmann says. It is counter cultural to stay in relationship. We are transient, busy people. We hop from church to church, job to job, and city to city. But attentive loving requires maintaining relationship even when it’s difficult. Practically this means managing our time well and maintaining the often monotonous rhythms of relationship.

“We should do this more” but it’s hard and exhausting. It requires open doors to our homes. It requires committing to people even if they are in a different life stage. It requires clearing out evenings in our iCal. It requires making peace where there is conflict. It requires attentiveness to other’s needs. It requires moving ourselves out of the center and placing another there.

We should do this more.

Just minutes into my son’s life, I owed him an apology. Glancing at his face confirmed an unfortunate reality. In the chromosomal battle for complexion, my DNA had won. He had my wrinkles.

My forehead is stacked with lines. But they aren’t noble like Clooney’s. They are more like a doctor’s signature than they are signs of maturity. Recently my face attempted some kind of Pangea and the wrinkles have come together to form a permanent sneer. So much so that I have to tell new colleagues and friends that I am not mad, just thinking.

Imagine my terror then when I realized that my son and I’s wrinkles are going to forever impact our trustworthiness.

The University College London and Dartmouth College carried out a series of experiments to see if people made decisions to trust others based on their faces. They found people are more likely to invest money in someone whose face is generally perceived as sincere, even when they are given negative information about this person’s reputation.

People make potentially costly (financial and otherwise) decisions based on a quick, instinctual sense of sincerity. This study shows that even if we are given negative information about a person, we still rely on our gut impulse (in this case based on dark eyes, soft facial features, etc) about someone’s trustworthiness. Our need to find trusted allies and our instinctual judgment about such matters is deeply human. But what do you do if everyone looks sincere?

Everyone is doing good these days and looking quite sincere about it. Commercials tell us that Pepsi refreshed some things, BP Oil invested $100m in some stuff, and AIG gave some money to people that needed it. Facebook tells us that every friend we have signed up to stop texting while driving, gave school supplies to foster kids, and enrolled in some kind of local co-op csa organic produce program. So what do we do when everyone is working so hard to look sincerely good?

Maybe you have some skepticism about BP and AIG’s sincerity, but what about Bono? You know the guy with the glasses that loves Africa? He’s a sincere, do gooding, trustworthy individual, right? While in Ireland in October he addressed questions about the success of the ONE Campaign’s goal to alleviate extreme poverty. He replied by saying, “it’s been extremely humbling.” He then explained that a campaign driven by celebrity charisma, advertisements, and consumerism had not really changed the world. In fact, the RED Campaign had a net profit of $18m (or 1/10 of the net profit brought in by U2’s last tour). The sincerity of Bono, the GAP and the consumers who purchased the products should not be questioned. They sincerely wanted to do good. But in a world where everyone is doing good, sincerity is no longer enough.

Sincerity is in desperate need of a partner. And I think if Match.com worked with virtues sincerity’s perfect match would be wisdom. Sincerity without wisdom is a Hallmark card. It’s a thoughtless attempt at showing desire rather than an active attempt at bringing that desire to life.

Our sincere desires are beautiful. At the start of the year we make lists of the things we desire. For example, this year I want to pray more. Sincerely. But without the thoughtful, hard, work of learning (and unlearning) how to better incorporate prayer into my life, my sincerity means nothing. Do you sincerely want to have a good marriage? There are books, groups, and therapists the can help. Do you sincerely want to start a business? There are free classes all over the city that can get you started. Do you sincerely want to be a good friend? Ask your friend how you can do that, and then do it. Do you sincerely want to have a stronger faith? Commit to a community, practice rituals, and study the teachings of your tradition’s saints. Pair your sincere desire with the humbling and difficult work of learning and watch out…success is before you.

Biologically and psychologically we make snap judgments about someone’s trustworthiness, but in time we will see that someone’s trustworthiness is founded less on their face shape or sincerity of heart and more on their willingness to try, fail, learn, and try again – the hard work that brings wisdom.

The sneery wrinkles and slightly downward turned lips of my son ensure that he will rarely be received as sincere. And although I sincerely want a wrinkle cream that can get rid of these face canyons, I hope to be a man and a father that works hard to pair sincerity with thoughtfulness. And maybe he and I can learn together how to do just that.

I sat down with a calculator and logged into my bank account. It was time for a 2012 Shappell Family Fiscal Review. The findings showed that we spent too much money on fancy meats (The Fatted Calf) and clothing (Steven Alan) and could have given more to our church.  But the scariest of all numbers was the amount paid to the SFMTA. We paid almost $1,000 in parking tickets. My wife’s face was redder than a Radio Flyer and my charming response was “Oh babe. Chill out. It is what it is.”

When things go wrong this is the sentiment of our day. Come out to a parking ticket? Couldn’t have helped it. It is what it is. Supervisor is upset with your recent performance at work? I’m not doing anything differently. It is what it is. Relationships always end traumatically? It is what it is. Congress doesn’t really solve the pending fiscal disaster? It is what it is. It truly does not matter the magnitude of the drama, we often respond with this lazy linguistic cop out. In our society that lacks the time and tools for reflection and seems prone to avoidance “it is what it is” might as well be our billboard. Rather than ask how we got here, we pop a Xanax and sleep it off.

What is missed in that sentiment towards life’s tragedies is that “it is what it is” often because “it is what it was.”

Sitting in a red, buttery, leather chair I stared across the desk at a man twice my age and whose salary had twice as many zeros. We were on the 30^th  and top floor of his office and I was politely letting him know that the consulting group I was working with had assigned me to be his coach.

“Have you ever even heard of the Beatles?” he said to shame and intimidate me.

After a sudden reorganization, Steve, who had worked with this software company for 18 years, was now reporting to Tom, the newly hired COO. While the majority of the company really enjoyed Tom and his managerial style, Steve was unhappy. I was coaching Steve because he had recently kicked a hallway recycling can over after yelling toward the CEO’s office that the organization was “headed to the dump.” For being so old and wise, he is obviously ignorant to how recycling works. GOT YOU OLD MAN!

Our first week together Steve explained his most recent 1-on-1 meeting with Tom. He said, “I sat down to tell Tom that we were not going to have the software updates ready to launch according to the timeline we had agreed to. Tom’s response was ‘its ok, we have a bigger product launch coming up, so how about you not worry about this miss and focus on what’s coming up?’ Can you believe that? I can’t stand the guy!”

I listened to these stories for five weeks. COO Tom sounded like an optimistic, future oriented, encouraging manager. Either I was a naïve young consultant who should not be coaching this Beatles loving can kicker, or both Steve and I had yet to discover why Tom bothered him so much. I chose to tell him that I was confused. I find confusion is best when shared.

On our sixth time together I said, “Steve, I am going to keep it short. I have no idea why you don’t like Tom. But I imagine that it doesn’t have to do with Tom. Instead of meeting today, why don’t you take time to think about who Tom reminds you of.” For the first time in our short relationship, he agreed with me without arguing and I left for the day.

The weekend came and I was enjoying brunch with my wife when my phone rang. It was Steve.

“Steve. How are you?”

“Tom is my ex-wife,” he said.

I wish he would have told me this before now! You would think that HR would have picked up on that!

“Tom’s endless optimism and smoke blowing reminds me of my wife.”

He would go on to explain that as he and his ex-wife began parenting teenagers she was relentlessly optimistic. For his wife each low grade was room for improvement, each speeding ticket was a reminder that actions have consequences, and every missed curfew was “at their own risk.” For Steve, a man who had been lauded for his financial accuracy and empirical decision making this positivity did not lead to better behavior only mischief and a directionless family.

Steve and I discovered the timeless truth: that our past influences the present.  That truth is why Dee Hock, founder of Visa, says that we must all take time to see how things were and how things are. He says that without doing this reflection we are unaware of how we see the world and risk catastrophe. Which makes sense because how can we heal what we do not know is wounded?

In my consulting work we refer to this as decoding. We must become familiar with our reptilian, natural reactions to things. We must ask: do you tend to over commit yourself? Why is that? Do you avoid conflict? Why is that? Do you get really excited when people talk about their feelings? Why is that? Do you hate it when the ice cube tray is left empty? That doesn’t need decoded. Everyone hates that.

But people don’t like this work. When I suggest to my friends that they enter therapy (a very helpful crucible for decoding) they do not hug me or mail me a gift card. In this day and age we avoid priests, therapists, social workers, and coaches like their advice comes laced with some kind of scurvy.

Further evidence that when given the choice we naturally choose steady, chronic pain over the temporarily acute pain that is the gateway to our freedom, wellness, and true peace.