Death by SUV

[Due to my site being hacked, I’ve had to repost a couple of pieces I wrote about Mark, as I was processing my grief in the aftermath of his death. The world is truly a cruel and heartless place at times. This was originally posted on Jan. 25.–jb]

As a late-blooming writer, I’ve maintained a commitment to working on my craft. Along the way, I’ve read a myriad of books that spoke about the writing process. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a book that talks about writing through grief, or possibly, how to put words on paper when your heart’s been ripped out and run over several times.

That’s a pretty shitty metaphor, I know. I’m just trying to paint a word picture of what I’ve been feeling since 10:30, Saturday night, when the trooper from the Maine State Police knocked on our door and delivered the news to Mary and me that our beloved son, Mark, had been hit by an SUV in Fort Walton County, Florida, and killed. Our lives as they’d been up to that moment were forever altered. Continue reading

Your Belief System

The person you are now was being developed many years ago. As a baby, people would smile at you and “coo” and you were already learning to perform for others, giving them what they wanted (and maybe more important, expected).

Over the years, all of those subsequent interactions formed the “print” of who you are; in essence, your self-image. The problem with that image is that it is based on the attitudes of others. The benefit derived for them is in who they think you are and the role that you’ve come to accept and play for them.

I’ve written often about reinvention here at the JBE. That journey continues, but I think I’ve arrived at a point where some newfound clarity was needed (and was missing).

My own lessons learned during the K-12 years and after—when I went off to college to play baseball, mainly—eventually led to a dead-end. At that point, I had to turn back, retrace my route, and find a different off-ramp, and a new road forward. that took place over a two-decade period.

There is a certain sameness that Americans crave and pervades life as we know it. I guess that’s why I’ve felt out of sorts for much of the past 10 months. The need for people I used to know to rush along with the rest of herd makes it hard to reconnect with most, if not all of them.

When my former boss died, I felt an obligation to reach out to former colleagues and people he knew in the workforce development world where I once resided, and where my mentor and I first met. Just like him, I’ve come to see that many of these former colleagues are pretty shallow; mere cardboard cutouts masquerading as human beings. I just shake my head thinking about some of the disingenuous email replies and responses I received.

I’ve intimated in this space that 2015 has been the most challenging year since I’ve been freelancing. It’s running neck and neck with a few other years back in Indiana, for most challenging ones in my life.

That being said, getting clear on some important things might just be the gift I wasn’t expecting from my year of adversity. As the dross has fallen away, I’m recognizing that I’ve gotten away from some basic values. I also recognize that there’s no value in forgetting the labor required to remove previous obstructions—I need to stay true to who I’ve become and not revert to the place where I was before.

So, can you define your core values? Also, are you where you want to be in your life? If not, why not?

It’s possible that you also have some work to do.

An Honest Conversation

So you want to talk about the road to success, eh? Seriously? Success often masquerades as Lady Luck. Finding the pathway that leads to the doorway of success isn’t simply maintaining the status quo, either.

How are you at managing adversity? Let’s talk when your prospects seem hopeless, and the light coming from the other end of the tunnel is most likely a train. That’s the kind of conversation I’m interested in having.

It’s never easy going through a rough patch. I think it becomes more difficult during these social media-influenced times, when it seems like everyone else is having a ball, and you’re sitting at home, alone, with a can of cheap beer and some second-rate movie from 1937 on the idiot box. When the losing streak stretches out for weeks and then months, being resilient is a requisite, but it sure as hell isn’t easy getting up each and every day and turning your frown into a big fat smile for the doubters to see.

And just like that, someone throws you a bone—or two—and the funk comes to an end.

Life’s funny like that.

You Can’t Handle The Truth

I had a post ready to go this morning. It was a post highlighting changes in the way we adapt to weather and events in our lives that are unexpected. Aspects of it dealt with something some call “learned helplessness.” There was an element of collapse involved. I guess I’ll leave that topic to others more qualified to write about it. This recent post referenced the idea that there was a time when “you could still talk about such things in public without being shouted down by true believers in perpetual progress and instant apocalypse, the Tweedledoom and Tweedledee of our collective non-conversation about the future.” That time is no more. Continue reading

One More Bump in the Road

First I fall off my bike and puncture my lung. Next, I’m being told “thanks, but no thanks,” in heading up an important workforce initiative.

I’ve been involved with the Maine Business Leadership Network for a year now. I was hired last August to serve as the first director of Maine’s only affiliate of the USBLN. I found out yesterday that the Maine State Chamber of Commerce isn’t “renewing my contract.” There are a number of things I could say; I’m certainly feeling a confluence of emotions, and having a variety of thoughts, some better not articulated at the moment. Apparently this is normal when you get kicked to the curb. I will say that I don’t feel like a year was a long enough period of time to prove the efficacy of what I was trying to do in leading the organization.  I’m sure some might disagree. Continue reading

Wisdom for my day

I think I mentioned that my mom, now dubbed St. Helen of Immaculata by my sister, often offered tidbits of wisdom in the form of sayings and even poems to the young JBE.

One in particular has stayed with me all these years. It’s authorship is unknown and I might argue that it’s loosely based on a poem by Rudyard Kipling. The wisdom expressed is something I can really understand now, 40+ years later.

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you’re trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest, if you must, but don’t you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about,
When he might have won had he stuck it out;
Don’t give up though the pace seems slow–
You may succeed with another blow.

Often the goal is nearer than,
It seems to a faint and faltering man,
Often the struggler has given up,
When he might have captured the victor’s cup,
And he learned too late when the night slipped down,
How close he was to the golden crown.

Success is failure turned inside out–
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far,
So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit–
It’s when things seem worst that you must not quit.

This second passage comes from none other than Confucius, arguably one of the greatest thinkers of all time.

The illustrious ancients, when they wished to make clear and to propagate the highest virtues to the world, put their states in proper order. Before putting their states in proper order, they regulated their families. Before regulating their families, they cultivated their own selves. Before cultivating their own selves, they perfected their souls. Before perfecting their souls, they tried to be sincere in their thoughts. Before trying to be sincere in their thoughts, they extended to the utmost their knowledge. Such investigation of knowledge lay in the investigation of things, and in seeing them as they really are. When things were thus investigated, knowledge became complete. When knowledge was complete, their thoughts became sincere. When their thoughts were sincere, their souls became perfect. When their souls were perfect, their own selves became cultivated. When their selves were cultivated, their families became regulated. When their families were regulated, their states came to be put into proper order. When their states were in proper order, then the whole world became peaceful and happy.

When all else fails us, I say look to the past to find your way forward.

 

Focus on what you can control

If you didn’t stay up ‘til just before midnight last night watching the Boston Celtics’ heartbreaking loss (heartbreaking, at least, if a fan of the green team), then this post might not interest you, or so you think. Stick with it a few more sentences however, so you’ll see where I’m going.

Basically, an aging team, beaten up, besieged by injuries and a steep underdog, rode their future superstar, Rajon Rondo, to the brink of pulling a huge upset. Instead, a few missed calls and officiating that seemed to be set upon protecting the NBA’s two certified superstars, Dwyane Wade and LeBron James, and marginalizing Rondo and Boston’s star Paul Pierce (who fouled out), prevailed; or so one kind of narrative goes. I haven’t listened to WEEI today, so I’m only guessing. Continue reading