‘When we know people whose lives are being destroyed and there seems to be no way of reaching them; when people are in impossible situations and there are no words to help them…hold them at the centre of prayer, where the divine Christ dwells, and expose them to the rays of his love.’ (Iain Matthew) Friedensgebet (‘prayers for peace’) felt even more earnest this evening than last time I was here. As we entered the church, each person lit a candle and placed it on a silver cross before a figure of the crucified Christ. It felt like holding the suffering of the world before one who knows what it is to endure pain. The candle I lit barely flickered at first, as if struggling to spark itself into even the tiniest glimmer of a flame. Hope, too, can sometimes feel like that. Those present reflected on certain parallels in German society today with those that preceded the rise of the Nazis so many years ago now. That was an unspeakably dark period in German history which, at times like this, still surfaces, smoulders and burns in the people’s collective psyche. I could feel their sense of concern and anguish about the forthcoming general election. Would Germany learn from its history, or would it find itself condemned to repeat it? As we prayed, I recalled Iain Matthew’s soulful spiritual wisdom: ‘Feel the way to the wound that is in us, to the place of our need. Go there, take it, name it; hold it before Christ. Feel our way to the wounds of this world, to those people or situations in dire need of healing. Go there, take them, name them; and hold them before him. Go there, not to dictate to Christ what the answer should be or what he should do about it; but to hold the wound before him.’ Yes.
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‘None of this is about morality, or religion, or dogma, or big fancy questions of life after death. The capital-T Truth is about life before death. It is about making it to 30, or maybe 50, without wanting to shoot yourself in the head.’ (David Foster Wallace) The seagulls woke me with their loud cries. I couldn’t tell if they were singing or screaming. Perhaps it was both. Still, it's better than the bellowing bark of the neighbour’s dog that shatters the sleep, silence and solitude most days. There are no lights outside on my house. Only a single candle with a flickering flame inside: enough, I pray, to hold back the darkness. Tis the season to be jolly and yet, as the sun rose this morning, I felt more like Neil Young’s lonely boy: ‘Can't relate to joy, he tries to speak and…can't begin to say.’ I felt lost for words. Mindfulness won’t bring peace on Earth and no amount of positive psychology will shift the mood. I can’t fake a façade, a smile – and I refuse to do it. This is spiritual, existential. I listened to and felt Anna Robbins’ words: ‘So here it is. The incarnation of God...is not a sweet baby Jesus moment. It is light in the midst of the deeps; meaning in chaos; presence in isolation…(It) remembers his coming, celebrates his presence. and anticipates a future coming when all will be made well. Which means all is not well right now…in an uncertain world filled with conflict and disorientation.’ ‘If you don't feel excited about the usual preparations, there is nothing wrong with you…(and) if you feel out of sorts, it's because we all are, and you choose not to pretend anymore…Honesty about what a mess things are enable(s) us to receive the light of Christ as reality in which we participate, rather than simply offer our carols as spiritual whistling in the dark.’ That resonates. It feels for me like touching a fundamental reality, a rock bottom from which the only way is up. It’s deep and it matters. It’s only against the backdrop of darkness that the nativity, the coming of Jesus – Light of the world – makes sense. As I look around and see worldwide poverty, violence, oppression, corruption and injustice, that Light is hope. ‘Every child you encounter is a divine appointment.’ (Wess Stafford) Words can’t capture it. Photos can’t express it. I can’t find a way to do it justice. The sheer, vibrant joy and excitement of 127 children this Christmas on receiving what they had asked for – a bag each with bright-coloured notepads, pens and a handful of sweets. Rewind for a moment. These kids live in a city cemetery in the Philippines. Yes, a cemetery, among the gravestones and broken down mausolea. Desperately poor, their families cling to the edges of society, surviving invisibly at meagre subsistence level. Imagine it. A Filipina saw them. She remembered vividly and painfully how, as a child living in dire poverty too, she never received a Christmas gift. Other children did and that felt sad and confusing. In her child's mind, she concluded that she must have done something wrong. It was only later in life that she learned that wealthier parents had paid Santa to distribute gifts to their own children. This experience burned deep in her soul. She’d always returned home heavy-hearted and empty-handed. She determined that these kids wouldn't. Back to now. The children knew something special was about to happen. She’d asked them in advance what they’d love – if God enabled a way to make it possible. ‘School bags!’ they replied. It was a humble and humbling request. As she arrived, the tension was tangible, the kids straining in eager anticipation to see what she’d brought. The Filipina had packed every gift individually, beautifully and prayerfully so that each child would know they are seen, valued and loved. The children skipped, sang and danced. A sacred encounter. What a gift. Remember the poor. We can be hope. ‘Hope reflects a psychological state in which we perceive the way-power and the willpower to get to our destination.’ (Charles Snyder) I’ve spent much of the past 18 years working with leaders in beyond-profit organisations, enabling them to lead and influence transitions in the midst of dynamically-complex change. This often involves helping them to develop the qualities and relationships they need to support themselves and others to survive, thrive and perform well in the face of an uncertain and, at times, anxiety-provoking future. A recurring challenge that such leaders encounter is how to instil and sustain hope within themselves as well as within and between others. Putting on a brave face my inspire confidence in the short-term but can feel inauthentic if their foundations are wobbling – and authenticity is a critical condition for building and sustaining trust. New leadership calls for resilience, resourcefulness and faith. Hope Theory offers some useful insights and ideas here. If we (a) have a desired future in mind (vision), (b) can see a way by which it can be achieved (way-power) and (c) are motivated to take action to do it (willpower), we are more likely to experience genuine hope. It’s very different to abstract idealism or naïve optimism, which may engender a good feeling but lack any grounding in reality. Yet what to do if someone is stuck: devoid of vision, unable to see a way forward or lacking in any sense of agency to do anything about it? This is where co-active leadership, coaching and action learning can really help; offering practical means by which people and groups can discover or create fresh goals, find or devise innovative solutions, and gain the traction they need to move things forward. Do you need help with hope? Get in touch! ‘Jesus - teach us to wait, as we hang in the balance of the past and the possible. Help us to make loving choices, as you did.’ (Thomas Merton) Who could have anticipated it? The Covid lockdown. Russia’s invasion of East Ukraine. 7 October Hamas attack. Ukraine (still) fighting back. Hezbollah decapitated. Free speech clampdown in UK. Iran firing missiles directly at Israel. Donald Trump re-elected in the US. North Korean deployment to Russia. French and German political meltdown. Sudden collapse of the Assad regime. The list goes on. Events appearing as if out of nowhere, taking by surprise. This is a backdrop to a BANI perspective on the world: Brittle, Anxious, Non-Linear and Incomprehensible. It’s not just a way of thinking about what’s happening around us. It’s an existential expression of how it can feel to be in the world. It shatters illusions of predictability and control. Think back at a more personal level – what have been your most significant life experiences over the past year? How many did you know or anticipate in advance? It corresponds, perhaps, to a rise in mental health crises across the world. If we can’t predict or control the future with any degree of certainty, it can leave us feeling anxious, stressed or depressed. After all, anything could come in from anywhere, disrupting our carefully-made plans and throwing everything, including ourselves, in the air – with no idea where it and we may land. Little wonder people are turning to ideologies and leaders that promise ‘security’. Yet so often their assurance is a façade; a delusion wrapped in compelling rhetoric that disguises its own emptiness. How, then, to survive and thrive in this earth-shaking context where threats ranging from climate emergency to nuclear war are real and extreme? I'm trying to follow Jesus’ example here: courage to face truth, prayerfully, head-on and not to hide; compassion to act, prayerfully, in humility and love: one person, issue and moment at a time. How about you? ‘Hope is being able to see that there is light, despite all of the darkness.’ (Desmond Tutu) A struggle I encounter existentially and in conversations with so many colleagues and clients at the moment is how to hold onto hope. Look at the news headlines and story after story of things going wrong. Not just small things but potentially world-ending things like climate disaster or nuclear war. The sense of overwhelm that this can create, along with a sense of complete powerlessness to change anything on that macro scale, can lead to feelings of deep despair. One option is to turn off the TV and social media news feed. It’s a bit like burying our head in the proverbial sand or sticking our fingers in our ears and singing, ‘La, la, la’. To be honest, on the mental health front, this kind of withdrawal can prove helpful and life-giving, at least for a while. After all, why burn ourselves out mentally, emotionally and physically for things over which we have zero influence anyway? Better, perhaps, to engage in mindfulness. Pause, breathe...relax. Except I’ve tried that and it doesn’t work for me. ‘I can’t close my eyes and make it go away.’ (U2) I’ve had to find a different way, and I’m still trying. German theologian Jürgen Moltmann wrote, ‘Hell is hopelessness.’ The need for hope is buried deep in the human psyche and the human condition. I find hope in Jesus and in taking action in my own small spheres of influence. I’m with Greenpeace on this: ‘The optimism of the action is better than the pessimism of the thought.’ How do you find and hold onto hope? ‘You're either coming out of a storm, in a storm or heading into a storm.’ (John Easley) Urban myth: ‘If we can just get through this, there will be calm waters ahead.’ Now, I concede that things may be less turbulent for a while than they are in the midst of whatever dramas today may bring, yet the new normal is to face continual and complex change. Think back for a moment to the most significant experiences you went through in the past 12 months, personally and-or professionally. I imagine that some of those things were anticipated, some less so, and some came from completely out of the blue; appearing like a rogue wave from left field. Mixed metaphors apart…this reality was certainly true for a group of UK health and social care professionals I worked with this week. The winds of change have left some feeling buffeted, battered and bruised by waves and, at times, clinging onto what feels like a shipwreck. It was also true for a Filipina teacher this week who, on discovering corruption that impacts seriously on her poorest students, registered her protest and resigned from her post as a matter of principle: no job to go to but with her ethics intact. The officials in question are now breathing threats. The good news is that not all changes are or feel so rough. There are clearly experiences in life and work that we initiate, control or welcome. At those times, it may feel like we’re surfing the waves, enjoying the rush of the ride and savouring its benefits. So, what can we do in those situations where we do feel out of our depth? How can we grow in our resourcefulness and resilience? Here are 3 things I'm still practising: 1. Pray: open myself to God and his perspective; 2. Prioritise: focus on who or what matters most; 3. Prepare: develop myself to be more agile. ‘People who are homeless are not social inadequates. They are people without homes.’ (Sheila McKechnie) A crisis moment. Sink or swim. Thrown in at the deep end. With no experience of management, residential care or homelessness, I was suddenly and unexpectedly handed responsibility for 3 hostels for young single homeless people with a 4th in the pipeline. The hostels were in crisis too, having being set up with little thought to the required expertise or financial resourcing. It was a stressful experience that I only survived thanks to God’s help and the good people around me. As part of my orientation, I visited a local project where a group of Christians were working with ‘rough sleepers’, that is people who lived on the streets and, for a complex range of reasons, at that time didn’t want to be housed. It turned out this group was very different to the hostels’ client group which comprised 16-24 year olds who found themselves homeless, mostly owing to mental health or relational breakdown, and wanted housing with resettlement support. The Christian group had conducted light-touch, sensitive research among local rough sleepers to find out what, if anything, they could offer in support. Most suggested very simple, practical things – ‘A place to take a shower’, or ‘Somewhere to wash and dry my clothes and sleeping bag.’ ‘And what else?’, the group asked. ‘A haircut’, ‘A shave’ or ‘To get my nails trimmed.’ The latter requests were all about feeling more human – and being seen and treated as more human. I found these insights very striking. The Christians opened a church building; lovingly fitted hot showers with perfumed, fresh-smelling shampoos, soaps and towels; installed washing machines and tumble-dryers; invited in local hairdressers to offer free haircuts and shaves and local beauticians to give free manicures and pedicures. The rough sleepers were still sleeping rough, but the restoration of their sense of human dignity, worth and self-respect was amazing. ‘Ethics is nothing other than reverence for life.’ (Albert Schweitzer) Are ethics situational or absolute? What might seem neat and tidy in a textbook or a classroom doesn’t always look and feel so clear when faced with complex realities on the ground. Picture this. Gill was working in a refugee camp amongst poor and displaced people. A boy, aged 12, approached her in a wheelchair. He’d had one leg amputated and the other was withered. ‘Got any fags?’ he asked. The thought of giving cigarettes to a child is a definite no-no…but what if he believed that’s what he needed to get through another bleak day of helplessness and hopelessness? An older boy offered to act as Gill’s bodyguard when she found herself surrounded by a large group of children whilst helping them to make free gifts of colourful wrist bands. ‘It’s not safe for you’, he argued. In return, he asked for the black bands. His plan was to corner the market and sell them to other boys. If Gill were to accept his offer, would that encourage entrepreneurialism or racketeering in the life of this young man? And how would he enforce her ‘protection’ among the mass of children who wanted to be there with her? How would they feel to be excluded? Gill sometimes sneaked in bags of rice because the food with which the refugees were provided was of terrible quality. Yet herein lay another challenge. As a volunteer, she couldn’t afford to buy such food for all 2,000 people in the camp. Would it be better to at least help some, with the associated risks of perceived unfairness, or better not to help any at all? If she were to be seen to show favouritism, what effect would resentment from others have on relationships within the camp? Should she eat her own, better food from outside to stay healthy whilst working there? A final and heart-breaking challenge came when a family invited Gill to their makeshift tent-home for sugary tea. It was show of hospitality, yet Gill felt conflicted as the family was already barely surviving on such meagre means. But to refuse would be culturally insulting. As she was about to leave, the father asked her in earnest, ‘Please will you take our son home with you? He would have much better opportunities there than here.’ Gill found herself wondering if she might do it, yet then felt torn for the impact on his family and for the other children she couldn’t take. Are ethics situational or absolute? You decide. ‘Small things with great love.’ (Mother Teresa) It’s one thing to flee your home from violence and war. It’s another to feel pushed to the edge of the place you hoped would show care and concern. The first thing Gill noticed about the refugee camp in Greece was its remote location, as if putting it there would keep Syrian and Afghan asylum seekers at a ‘safe’ distance from local people. Out of sight, out of mind. Police outside the walls helped to ensure that no-one escaped to the nearest town. Food was delivered by the army and was often infested with 'crawling things'. A child wrote on the wall of a tent in marker pen: ‘We are not animals!’ It was a silent plea to be seen, to be treated as human beings. Tents on dusty ground. No electricity. Water on-and-off. Hope withered under the heat of the sun. Gill volunteered at a family centre; a fenced-off tent where women could have some privacy, feel safe, together. She offered hand-massage and some took it up, sitting on the floor together as she did so. A little girl observed at a distance. She asked to learn, then massaged Gill’s hands. Gill offered to massage the women’s feet too, yet many refused. She discovered they were ashamed of their unpedicured, dirty feet. Gill brought in bottled water to wash, but those who accepted the offer felt embarrassed when their feet made the water in the bathing bowl dirty. But then a breakthrough happened. One day as Gill was carrying the bowl to the tent, a breeze caught pretty petals on a tree and they floated down, forming a beautiful pink canvas over the surface of the water. It felt like a miracle from God. The women were delighted: ‘That’s so lovely. We can’t see the dirty water now. Just the beautiful flowers!’ Gill added lemons too. It was a life-giving gift of dignity restored. As days passed by, a growing queue of women formed at the tent. One brought a radio and played music. Some started dancing, and they got Gill up to dance too. Women were chatting and laughing now. As Gill continued this work, a girl leaned on her shoulder and saw with her own eyes: pink petals and a human touch brought love, joy and hope. |
Nick WrightI'm a psychological coach, trainer and OD consultant. Curious to discover how can I help you? Get in touch! Like what you read? Simply enter your email address below to receive regular blog updates!
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