I have this friend. She is truly brilliant in her profession and, honestly, mostother endeavors she chooses to pursue. At least for a little while. The pattern is familiar. Extreme excitement at the “new thing”. Enthusiasm. Engagement. Sharing. And then, not very much longer—silence. No more shared stories of progress or how this great new thing is going to radically change everything. It is as though some meteor brilliantly sailed by, then passed into dust. In its wake is left the echo of the fleeting memory of something wonderful, now completely distant but unfortunately not totally forgotten.
The oddest part is that this is not the way it is for everything. Her professional success is constant. And growing. But she never takes any credit for making it happen. Success at the job is an accident. She is only a willing bystander as she reaches number one in her company out of thousands. Red runs in her cheeks as she proclaims it has nothing to do with her. Ever. Each new advancement is described as just another “happy accident.”
It took me awhile to realize that, for her relationships are much the same way. They are a play in which she serves only as an extra. Whatever happened is largely due to the other person. If they decide to stay, or make the first move all the better. If they never call, well then there will be no call. The end result is she lives in a constant place of remembrance. As her mind, like everyone’s, glosses over the valleys and the peaks and transfigures the past into one gallery worthy painting. But like so many great paintings, the truth is in the eye of the beholder and a distant eye can affix whatever truth it wishes to see in the brushstrokes or the memory of a love thought true.
It took me longer to see the challenges of my friend more clearly in myself. Realizing that the affliction of my friend is often an affliction for us all. It was and is a reminder of just how terrified some people can be of the dreaded word:Accountability. If we never acknowledge that we have the power to be good, that is us who earned the promotion or lost the weight or held it together during a crisis, then we never have to admit it is us who pulled the lever on the slot machine, took the drug, or gained the weight. Once responsibility is absolved—then so is blame. But so is power. Power to make the same mistake—or power to make a better choice.
I thought about that this morning as I was jogging around my hotel parking lot. Mid stride of my attempt to lose weight—again. Every once in a while, I get a clear view of myself in a mirror and an argument ensues somewhere deep in my psyche. One voice saying: you lost it before and gained it back, why will this be any different—why bother? The other voice saying: you know you can do this—just keep at it longer this time and it will become a habit and you CAN keep the weight off. This morning I caught a glance of a young woman walking out of the hotel. In her hand a large coffee/milk/sugar concoction with probably 1000 calories or more. In the same hand was a lit cigarette. Under her clothes was about 100 pounds of extra weight. I instantly felt bad for her. I had a view of her future—our current and future national health crisis propelled by millions of people making the same choices she did and slowly descending into a life of crisis that is part of a world of crisis. I could not help but connect the dots from my friend to this stranger and my own choices good and bad. Taking a chance on love—good. Taking a chance on some other things—well, not so good.
But in the end, we have to acknowledge that the painting we paint is indeed our own. We chose the colors—we make the strokes. Some will be great, some not so much. But the image is ours. If we can do that, make that first great acceptance—then we open a door to a great many possibilities and the realization that we are not the victim of another person’s choices—but the byproduct of our own creation. Spider Man said: “with great power comes great responsibility”—but how many realize that the power belongs to everyone and so does the responsibility and, even more importantly: the possibility.
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