Living Your Legacy

I love TED talks, and am especially excited about the upcoming TEDx Brighton.  The theme for 2013 is legacy - a word ripe with connotations.

We tend to think about a legacy as something that is left behind us; usually after we die or retire.  Something seen in our wake....  A legacy may be financial, cultural or structural.  It is usually something pretty big, concrete, fixed; it might even be legendary.

Whilst our lives have undoubtedly been improved by great legacies - scientific, cultural, philosophical and more - the very idea of a legacy can smack a bit of arrogance.  And it may be closely associated with the kind of charismatic leadership that is great when ‘good’, but can easily slip across to the dark side.  We only have to think about some recent political legacies to come up with examples.

On an individual level, for examples in my coaching conversations, inviting someone to focus on the legacy they wish to create in their team or organisation can be hugely motivating.  And the old question of what we might wish people to say at our funeral or in our obituary is a great focuser of mind.

And yet focusing on the grand ‘gift’ we will leave behind - on working towards this future goal - can take us away from the moment; away from the quotidian ways in which we make a difference.

The original meaning of the word ‘legacy’ is a "body of persons sent on a mission,", hence the papal legates ("ambassadors, envoys") of the history books.  Only in the mid 15th century did it become associated with "property left by will" and the sense of some edifice left behind.

If our legacy is an outward expression of our mission - and we are our own emissaries - we can choose how to focus; where we will send our message.  Every living day we can send ourselves on a special mission as diplomatic representatives of our credo.  

How might we do that?

Perhaps one of the best legacies we can live and leave would be to have a ‘good life’.  Palliative care nurse Bronnie Ware shone a light on what such a life might be made of when she captured the top regrets of her patients.  These were:

• I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me
• I wish I hadn't worked so hard
• I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings
• I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends
• wish that I had let myself be happier

I think that the simple acts of expressing ourselves, being true and connecting with others can add up to one of the greatest living legacies.

In The Mastery of Self Expression workshop, we see time after time the effect of people choosing to represent their personal credo more faithfully, openly and bravely.  It is a huge relief to many to be able to speak up after what feels like a long time in limbo.    It is incredibly moving to be accepted as we are in all our power, messiness and vulnerability.  And when people show up and are acknowledged, they not only connect more powerfully with others, but they give those others permission to show up too. 

Dan Fauci, creator of The Mastery, humbly calls it ‘changing the world, one person at a time’!  I think this is a huge part of my living legacy.  Firstly to send ripples out into the world around me, simply by connecting just a little more fully, honestly and lovingly.  Second, to play a part in lighting a fire in others that helps bring their legacy to life as well.

I have to say that’s its a huge privilege, and enough of a legacy for me.....

NB Do share your ideas here.  I’d love to know what living your legacy means to you.

¹ Ware, B. Top Five Regrets of the Dying: A Life Transformed by the Dearly Departing; Hay House, 2012

² The Mastery of Self Expression, created by Dan Fauci at The Actor’s Institute, NYC.  See www.brighton-mastery.co.uk

Open to Connection

Photo by Lynda Kelly

I've just experienced my first equine assisted learning session, with the lovely (and just a bit frisky) Charlie.

Its a long time since my last encounter with horses, and to be honest enforced riding school lessons as a girl were not my idea of a relaxed Sunday morning, so I was feeling curious but a little reticent.  Yet Charlie (and my talented facilitator Sharon*) taught - or retaught - me a valuable lesson.

When we started to work, Charlie and Jack came over to our end of the field; curious.  And when Sharon brought Charlie into our smaller paddock, he came up to me at the fence for a stroke.  After initially wanting simply to feel comfortable around the horses, and them around me, I soon wanted to get closer.

Working with Charlie in the paddock I knew he was aware of me; twitching his ears; looking from the corner of his eye.  And he wasn't spooked by me.  But of course he did have other things to be interested in - eating grass; where his friend Jack had got to….

I was working hard on connecting with him.  I was probably resolved to get closer, or have him come closer to me; yet we skirted around each other's boundaries for quite a while.

Eventually I felt a shift and relaxed a little more - perhaps I had resigned myself to it not happening this time.  I also let go of some self consciousness.  I felt my legs flex just a little as I breathed out more deeply.  Charlie lifted his head and walked straight towards me.  I stroked his nose, then offered a piece of apple I'd had hidden and he took it softly.

When Charlie went back into the main field he galloped up and down in front of us, kicked his hind legs in the air and then lay down and rolled about.  His raw energy was tangible.

I think much of our search for connection, or for the things we want to appear in our lives can be like this.  We feel we need to go after our dreams; to chase; to move towards something or someone.  If our pursuance of someone is too targetted or rigid, it can feel claustrophobic.

It is said that neediness is an unattractive trait - a passion-killer.  I think it is less someone's pure 'need' and more the demands and expectations they place on others that feels difficult.    

Our expressions of need are rarely moments of openness or pure vulnerability.  They are often tinged with anger or control.  'I need love' is very different from 'I need you to love me' or 'you don't love me enough’.

I think I had had a picture of how connecting with Charlie would be.  I know I wanted him to respond in a certain way.  And when I let that go, I stopped trying so hard.  Perhaps by simply opening myself up to the possibility of connection, I made it more possible for him to approach me.  Or so it seemed. 

*  Sharon Clifton of Equus Reflects - 07720 190722

The Unknowing on the OTHER side of Knowing

I have just got a keyboard, and spent several days last week making weird noises on it, and writing embryonic songs.  It was great fun, and in some ways my lack of knowledge - such as what notes are in which key and what the (many!) knobs do - meant that I was more able to experiment and be intuitive.  Sooner or later of course, my desire to make 'music' - something that is repeatably nice - and to use the full capability of the equipment will lead me to learn some rules.  The trick will be to re-find the freedom of “not knowing” once I get to the other side…..

In many contexts, we need to know enough about rules, to have enough structure, to really enable us to be free.  

This is often a theme in descriptions of the creative arts - such as jazz music, abstract painting and poetry - in which there is a sense of freedom built on a clear framework and great technique.

It is certainly true in my coaching and facilitation work; clients and I need a certain amount of structure - some contract about how we will work - in order to forget about it and really be in the moment. In this place of not knowing, we might find a deeper truth.

Oliver Wendell Holmes famously said “I would not give a fig for the simplicity this side of complexity, but I would give my life for the simplicity on the other side of complexity.”

Me too…..

What's New?

I have a confession to make.  I never watch TV news.  I rarely listen to British radio news.  So I didn't know until lunchtime that nothing was happening today.  No-one has told the birds......  The world outside still seems to be spinning…

When the news of no news caught up with me (in the same way that the actual news usually does, "mediated" via friends, family and the web) I watched the clips of silent newsreaders smirking, shuffling blank papers, tossing their hair, eyeing us like deep sea divers…  Had they dropped the performances and genuinely tried to say nothing, they might have 'spoken' eloquently.

The only news I hear on a regular basis is in French, on our local relayed version of FIP radio.  My French is good enough to pick up key events (to know if there is something I should investigate), but not good enough to be 'told' the details.  I like that.

I like to know what is going on in the world.  But I want to learn what it means through experience and conversation; through my senses; through connecting with a range of perspectives. I prefer "deepcast" to broadcast news.

One of the maxims in The Mastery of Self Expression workshop (www.brighton-mastery.co.uk) is that 'there is no new information in here (in our heads)…  all new information is out there…'  If we keep returning to our established thought patterns, we stay stuck in the stories we tell.  Equally, if we listen too much to one person's or one medium's 'take' on the truth, we can get stuck there too….

In his poem Asphodel, that greeny flower, William Carlos Williams talks of how hard it is to get the kind of information we need; the kind that might save us.

My heart rouses

thinking to bring you news

of something

that concerns you

and concerns many men.  Look at

what passes for the new.

You will not find it there but in

despised poems.

It is difficult

to get the news from poems

yet men die miserably every day

for lack

of what is found there.

Hear me out

for I too am concerned

and every man

who wants to die at peace in his bed

besides.

Where might we find some real news today?

Do not torture yourself with shallow water

What is love like?  A red, red rose?  Hell? Blind? 

Does it make the world go round, or mess up our hearts and minds?

Is Social Psychologist Erich Fromm right when he says that "Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence."? 

This week I've been thinking a lot about love, in preparation for a Valentine's week workshop I ran last night for the fabulous Fresh Air group here in Brighton. @FreshAirBtn

What other aspect of our lives sparks such joy, contentment, regret and outright fear (not to say 'squeamishness' as one brave participant had it).  In a week associated with grand gestures, hallmark schmaltz and, for many, a greater sense of loneliness, it was interesting that our participants focussed not just on romantic love, but on love in its broadest senses.

The Greeks, who perhaps knew a thing or two, identified no less than six different kinds of love….

Philia - a deep but usually non-sexual intimacy between close friends and family; or as a deep bond of 'brotherhood' between soldiers 

Ludus - a playful affection found in fooling around or flirting

Pragma - the mature love that develops between long-term couples and involves actively practising goodwill, commitment, compromise and understanding. 

Agape - a more generalised love for all of humanity

Philautia - self love 

and finally, the sometimes troublesome

Eros - sexual passion and desire

And yet many modern images of love would have us searching for the one person who can give us all of this; who will make us ‘complete’... 

I am especially fond of Dr Seuss’ definition of love: "We're all a little weird, and life's a little weird. And when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall in mutual weirdness and call it love." 

We like to think that we will love unconditionally.  But its hard.  We are making micro deals with our loved ones, and ourselves, all the time.  We make conditions - I’ll love you (more) if you......  And as potentially undermining of love as these are, they are nothing compared with the conditions we have created for ourselves in our heads - that people would love us (more) if only we were......  We create elaborate ways in which we may not be enough; may not be loveable just as we are. 

Love hurts.  Or at least the feeling of rejection often associated with its withdrawal does.  So it is hardly surprising that we tread carefully for fear of getting hurt; that we hold a part of us back just in case.  

Kahil Gibran tells us that this is only half loving: "But if in your fear you would seek only love's peace and love's pleasure, then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass out of love's threshing-floor, into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears."

Or in the words of a Bulgarian proverb: “If you wish to drown, do not torture yourself with shallow water” 

We may tell ourselves say we will open up, reveal our true selves, when we meet someone we trust and can love….  and so we carry on hiding.

We usually think we are the only ones doing this, that everyone else has it sussed.  But imagine a room, a town, a world full of people all protecting their vulnerabilities, their darkness.  In such a world of dares, who is going to go first? 

In my experience of working with dozens of individuals one-to-one and in workshops like The Mastery of Self Expression, it is when we have the courage to show up with all of our faults, all of our anger and fear, all of our sadness, that we are most loveable; when we are indeed all beautiful…. 

Do let me know what you think