The Little Things

Shot from our first Wednesdays @ 1 Webinar Series

The last few days I have been thinking a lot about all the things that we have taken for granted through the years, certainly things that I have for all my life.  Things like sitting in a meeting with my peers, business travel, giving someone a hug, or just shaking a hand.  Attending church, sitting on the sidelines of a soccer game, dropping my kids off at school.  The list goes on and on.  They are small things, indeed very small things and yet, those small things I realize now are what built my sense of community and camaraderie. They defined my relationships and in some ways my self worth. 

Through these days my highs and lows could be tracked like the tides, though not as predictable.  And I am now realizing that it's not the big picture news creating these swings but rather the loss of the little things.  The routines I had blindly followed and the gestures I had unconsciously made were the bedrock of my being.  If I can’t hug someone, how do I show them that I care? If we can’t sit in a room together, how do we have community? If my kids can’t go to school, how do I keep my sanity?  (Sorry, that one just slipped in there.)

I think all of us are somewhere in the process of dealing with this, of recalibrating and redesigning ourselves in light of the new social rules. Of course we have all tried to hold on to the old.  I know a few of you have pulled out your lawn chairs in your driveway with a neighbor or two, and probably more than one of you have ventured into Lowes on Saturday to buy plants.  We crave those rituals of gathering.  And yet we are being forced to redefine what those will look like in the future. How do we move forward from here?  What does that look like? 

I had the opportunity yesterday to listen to Bob Phibbs, a well known speaker on retail and retailing.  His message was exactly what I needed to hear. While pragmatic and grounded, it was rooted in hope.  Today is different, tomorrow will be different too, and to stare at the past and think we are going back is helpless.  So what is one thing I can do today to move us, to move me, further down the path tomorrow?  I can focus on the things I control and be hopeful and provide hope to my family, my business, and our customers.  Bob so aptly stated that his marching orders, his mantra is, “In hope I am fearless.” I love that. We need to be fearless now.  We need to embrace these new opportunities to connect as awkward and as clumsy as we may be in doing so.  You know the old saying, it's hard to teach an old dog new tricks.  Well, throw that out the window.  Embrace fearless, commit to learning the new.  Be vulnerable. 

I have great hope for a new way of connecting. Already I am gaining composure and comfort with video conferencing and software I would have never learned before. My brother is teaching himself social media one YouTube message at a time. I facetimed with my parents last weekend even if my mom did set the phone down on the table for some of it.  My ten year old daughter who had professed that she hates technology, is now a master at Google Classroom and Chatroom, and is navigating her way independently around e-learning.  This week I watched one of our design partners host a three day virtual webinar for their designers that they would have never done before.  Young and old, at work and at home, we are all having to learn, but the beauty, the silver lining, is that we are all learning together.  

Learning takes vulnerability.  In order to learn, you must admit that you don't know.  It's uncomfortable for most of us, especially as we get older.  But it's perhaps the most human thing there is.  So, what little thing will you do tomorrow to be fearless?  What's one thing you will you do to give hope to those around you?  I challenge you to commit to being human.  Commit to learning the new.  Remember, in hope we are fearless.