Michele Woodward

Powerful Coaching. Powerful Results.

loss

What’s Really Important

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MTW and LaFo

I’m writing this just before I leave the house to fly to Atlanta for the funeral of my dear friend, the writer and brand strategist Laurie Foley.

You’ve all been so kind these last weeks as Laurie’s condition progressed ever closer to her death.

In fact, you were cheering for her back in 2014 when she went into remission: I wrote this then, You Get To Decide, and I heard from so many of you that her story was inspirational.

And the response to my more recent posts, Real and Raw and last week’s The Price of Friendship have been warm and embracing for me. Just when I needed it most.

So, I thank you, from the bottom of my heart.

And I thank Laurie for bringing friendship, kindness and caring into such sharp focus for so many through her dying process. Even when she had so little strength, the woman had a lot of energy.

Take care of yourselves, friends. And take care of those you love. Make time for them. Honor them. Be kind.

It’s loss like this which reminds us what is really important.

 

Tell Me, Who Are You?

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Horse & CarriageThey were at the absolute top of their game. Masters of their craft, they knew exactly what their customers needed.

They knew how different materials created different results, and worked tirelessly to turn out quality products.

They started as boys, became apprentices, and then were masters of their own shops. Esteemed and valued, they were absolute experts in their field.

And it was a field that was dying.

Because these were the buggy whip manufacturers of 1900.

Oh, they knew exactly how to make a whip for you if you had a pony cart. And what to make if you were driving a team of eight. They knew the perfect supple leathers to use, and how to make the best grip for any kind of weather.

They were amazing artisans.

But by about 1930, cars had overtaken the horse and buggy, and fewer and fewer people needed a whip to drive their non-existent team of horses.  In the span of a just few years, the centuries-old whip making industry was dead.

And many people were out of a job.

I’ll bet there were plenty of old whip makers who sat around on porches and complained that the world was a hard place, and lamented that a way of life was gone – a way of life that was good, honest and simple.

I’ll also bet that there were some buggy whip makers who saw the writing on the wall and became leather workers in another field. They fashioned belts or jackets. Or sofas.

Or maybe went outside their trade and became chauffeurs of new-fangled automobiles.

Or started a real estate business. Or went to school.

They acted.

It seems to me that there are always some people who take loss – expected or unexpected – as a catalyst to shape a new identity. They drop an old way of being and exchange it for a new way of living, seemingly taking it all in stride.

And then there are those who don’t.

Isn’t that fascinating? Someone was really great – at the top of their game – as a… travel agent. And rather than say, “I was a great travel agent, and I’m sure I’m going to be a great at something new”, they spend their energy wishing that the entire world would change and everyone would start using paper tickets again. Maybe someone felt so in the zone as a journalist, or a record label executive, or a book publisher – and then technology forever changed those fields.

It seems like some of us bang our heads against the wall desperately trying to find another job just like the one that will never, ever exist again.

Likewise, maybe we’re stuck because we got such comfort and sense of place being someone’s… spouse, child, grandchild, loved one.

Yet we spend our days honoring the gap in our lives rather than honoring the lives that were lived.

It’s important to grieve loss. In fact, it’s vital to your overall health and well-being – you have to understand what happened, and try to find a why…if there is a why to be found.

But it’s what you do when you find yourself in one of these change points makes all the difference.

You need to fashion a new story of who you are – a new identity – which honors the past but allows you to be fully present in the here and now.

To even get started, you have to be brave.

To take the first steps, simply embrace even the saddest loss as an opportunity to create a new identity. Draw strength from how great you were with the person or thing you loved, but move forward fully open to the idea that something new can be something good, too.

Or, alternatively, you can sit on the porch with your complaints and cling to the past.

The choice is entirely yours.

 

One Tough Week

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There have been tough weeks in the past. And it’s likely that there will be tough weeks in the future. But, boy, this week?

This was one tough week.

Boston.

West, Texas.

Capitol Hill.

China.

It’s been overwhelming. And, you know what? I’m not going to try to make you feel better by writing a bunch of “look on the bright side” platitudes.

Nope.

Instead, I’m going to say: “It really was a tough week – one of the toughest. Why not treat yourself as you would treat anyone you love who’s had a tough week?”

Oh, you might want to close your eyes, stick your fingers in your ears, say “Naa, naa, naa, I can’t hear you” and pretend it didn’t happen (I’ve tried it, trust me).

But you can’t change reality. And neither can I.

All we can do is acknowledge the shock, pain, and loss, and be good to ourselves.

For me, that looks like time with family, time in the garden, time alone with a book. Getting back to my center.

Because I know that restorative energy and peace come when you’re at center.

And, of course, let’s be kind to others, because you’re not alone in this bad week. Not at all. In fact, we’re all in this together.

Together, standing at the side of the road clapping  and cheering for those who would run toward rather than run away.

[OK, maybe that’s inspiration. Can’t help myself, I guess.]

May peace find you – find us all – in ways both large and small.

 

All That Was Lost

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I am an alumna of Virginia Tech.

As that April day in 2007 unfolded, I couldn’t keep the tears away. I grieved and mourned for those who died, and for the university. Forever, the words “Virginia Tech” would be linked with tragedy.

And, now Sandy Hook Elementary will be likewise linked. Forever.

Once again, the tears flow.

In the five years since the shootings at Blacksburg, we’ve aggregated that loss into “32 shot and killed, 17 wounded”, which is what we humans want to do. We want to be tidy and quantify loss into a manageable package – maybe in an effort to minimize our aching pain.

But now is not the time for tidy.

Now is not the time to start saying, “20 students and 6 adults at Sandy Hook”. No, that’s too easy.

Because what we need to do today is remember. And fully feel the pain.

We must be brave enough to see each of the lost as the individuals they were.

We need to honor first graders Avielle, and Chase, and Emilie, and Catherine, and Ana – knowing that these children will now never have a first dance, a driver’s license, a college acceptance letter.

Let’s remember Dylan, and Madeline, and Jack, and Benjamin, and Noah – young people who will never have a first job, or buy a house, or hold their baby in their arms.

Our thoughts need to include Olivia, and Daniel, and Caroline, and Jessica, and Allison – who leave paintings unpainted, words unwritten, and creations unmade.

Grace, and James, and Jesse, and Josephine, and Charlotte – may never have had a wiggly tooth, and now…never will.

Then, there are the adults we lost – Mary, and Victoria, and Anne Marie, and Lauren, and Dawn, and Rachel. There is no doubt in my mind that their last thoughts were about the safety of the children in their care, and they died in service to those kids.

That care and service is the legacy we must carry forward with us. To inspire us, and to focus our own choices and behavior.

Imagine if every day, each one of us asked: “What can I do to insure a child’s safety today?”

Why, we would change the world.

In 2007, the poet Nikki Giovanni wrote a praise poem which she read in Blacksburg. Its refrain was a powerful call, reminding us all that “We are Virginia Tech.”

And, now, we are all Sandy Hook Elementary School.

We are all the parents of these lost children.

We are the spouses of these lost adults.

We are their brothers, their sisters, their aunts, their uncles, their cousins, their neighbors, their friends.

And as such, we can never forget.

Never.

We are all Sandy Hook. And we will never aggregate our grief into mere numbers. Twenty children and six adults killed – no, that does them no justice.

We must remember their names, and their lives, and their loss – their humanity and their individuality. They walked, they talked, they loved.

They are each so much more than numbers. So very much more.

You and I live in a social compact with one another – a compact which orders our communal life. Like agreeing to stop at stop lights, and give emergency vehicles the right of way, and knowing when your right to swing your arm ends at the other fella’s nose. Perhaps the loss of these dear ones will lead us to strengthen our social compact, but that discussion comes next. After today.

Today, now – our social compact calls for deep grief, deep remembering and shared commitment to honoring the lives that were lived.

While we hold dear all that was lost.