dare to dream

Our Inner Goliath

If I were to ask, "Who do you most relate to -- David or Goliath?", most of us would answer, "David".  And that's a good thing.

But before we go in-depth (in another post) on the David archetype, let's consider for a moment that we might want to -- and can -- tap into our inner Goliath as well.   

In Malcolm Gladwell's May 2009 article How David Beats Goliath, he cites political scientist Ivan Arreguin-Toft who has analyzed every war fought between strong and weak combatants over the past 200 years.  "The Goliaths, those in which the stronger side was at least 10x more powerful, in terms of armed might and population", he found, "won in 71.5% per cent of the cases."

You may be thinking -- I like those odds, but when am I ever in a situation where I am 10x more powerful than my opponent?

More often than we believe.

Whether making something happen for ourselves, our family, business, or community -- power comes when we play to our strengths.  In war, strength is defined as "armed might and population".  In tacking life's challenges, strength(s), according to Dr. Laura Morgan Roberts, can be defined as:

1.    Our innate talents.
2.    The competencies we've developed;
3.    What we believe (our principles);
4.    Our identities (gender, race, ethnicity, religion).

What are your strengths?

Are they so much a part of who you are you don't recognize them?

Once you identify them, will you own them?

If we really believed that the odds of success were in our favor 7 out of 10 times, as did Goliath, how much more would we take on?

Men's Health: What Women Can Teach Men About Real Strength

A few months ago Richard Conniff interviewed me for an article in Men's Health Magazine titled What Women Can Teach Men About Real Strength:  Workplace Lessons from Women.  

Conniff writes, "In the modern workplace, the best way for a man to succeed might actually be to suppress his caveman and try to think like a woman instead.  It's not about acting like a woman. People respond badly to what psychologists call "gender rule violations." Nor is anyone suggesting that women always make ideal employees. They can be just as stupid as men can be.

Source:  istockphoto

But the case for learning a few basic skills from the so-called weaker sex is simple: Women are succeeding in a time when men generally aren't. Four out of five jobs lost in the current recession belonged to men. (It's been dubbed the "he-cession.") Male-dominated construction and manufacturing sectors are taking the hardest hits."

I'd read the whole article, but if you'd like to go to where I'm quoted, you can click on the below links.

• Overview
• Don't Think Just Inside the Company
• It's Not Just About the Money

There were so many interesting points.  What caught your attention?  As you share your thoughts, I'll talk back more than usual.  Not in the saucy sort of way I did to my mother as a teenager, but politely -- a civil discourse or dialogue. This could be fun!

In thinking about what men can learn from women, what can women learn from men?  Specifically, if we revisit the Psyche Myth, and take a look at the helpers (ants, eagle, etc) as skills that men in our lives may have already mastered, what can we learn from our husbands, sons, brothers, colleagues?

Eunice, we hardly knew you...

I would encourage you to read Sisterhood's special bond, a piece eulogizing Eunice Kennedy Shriver.

Boston Globe columnist Yvonne Abraham begins, "She has been remembered as the sister of Jack, Bobby, and Teddy.  But if you must think of this remarkable woman as someone's sister, think of her as Rosemary's. Because it was Rosemary Kennedy who made Eunice who she was."

 Source:  Boston Globe/UPI

Here's the highlight:

"Even at a tribute to her in 2007, the woman who many allowed might have been president if only she'd been born a man said "I am lucky that I experienced the sting of rejection as a woman who was told that the real power was not for me.  I am lucky that I saw... Rosemary treated with the most unbearable rejection. It's really that simple.  Love gave me confidence and adversity gave me purpose."

In Alyson Jenkins' piece, Be your Own Batman she writes that women are defined in relation to someone else:  someone's mother, sister, aunt, wife, someone's Robin.  Even with Ms. Shriver, we know her best as someone's sister.

Joseph Kennedy was quoted as saying "had she been a man, Eunice would have made a fine politician."  As she herself states, there was a 'sting' to this.  We've all felt the 'sting' of adversity.  It is in the overcoming that we find our best self. 

What is your hardest test thus far?  In the overcoming, who did you become?

But adversity alone is not enough.  For it can just as easily lead to defeat as to triumph.  It was her love of Rosemary, and the difficulty surrounding Rosemary's mental retardation, and subsequent lobotomy, that drove Ms. Shriver to eventually found the Special Olympics. 

Who and what do you love so deeply, that this love becomes a well-spring of confidence?

Love gave me confidence and adversity gave me purpose.

Words to cherish...

...And a woman I would like to have known.

Send Perfectionism Packing

I've thought about this post for several days, but have put it off.

Ironic, but not surprising I suppose, given the topic is perfectionism.  

As a child, there were so many things I did well, I could afford to be a perfectionist.  In high school it became a problem.  I almost didn't take AP American History.  I didn't take Calculus.  Nor would I take Econ because I feared I couldn't get an 'A'.  I did get 'A's in the classes I took, but in retrospect, a 'B' in Calculus, rather than no calculus at all given my chosen career, probably would have been a decent trade.

Enter the workforce.

When I got to New York, I wanted to succeed so badly, I had to square off with my perfectionism, muscling through the fear.

And I had to learn a few tricks.  Like breaking things down into small enough pieces that I wouldn't be overwhelmed.  Or telling myself to spend just spend 5 minutes putting everything together that I'd need, and then I could go do something else.

Even a decade ago, I probably wouldn't have participated in the Resolutionary Challenge because I  couldn't have gotten a 10 every day.  Now I'm happy to get the score I get (and it's never a 10) because I'm willing to take happier and healthier, over perfect or bust.

Courtesy:  Sarah Jane Studios

When I do send perfectionism packing (and when I can't quite, I pull out a few tricks to pretend as if I have), I try more new things, and I learn more.

I can model for my children how to cope with perfectionism.

I get more accomplished because I procrastinate less.

I stop something I've started when I realize it's not worth finishing.

I am willing to date dreams, knowing I don't have to marry them.

Most importantly, I can welcome in my world.

Happily. Exuberantly.

With arms outstretched.

If you didn't feel the need to be perfect at a 'thing', what would you try doing?

What dream would you like to date?

What are you currently working on that isn't worth finishing?

What tips do you have for outwitting perfectionism?

My husband who is trained as a scientist can break projects into very small, logical pieces -- he is a superb peer mentor.  How can some of the men in our lives -- fathers, brothers, sons, husbands, colleagues - mentor us?   

Related posts:
Living the dream.  Life's a breeze.  Not.
If you get defensive, you're getting close
What if Madeleine L'Engle hadn't dare to dream?
Getting back in the saddle of our possibilities
Mum's the word

About the Atta G'I'rl + Resolutionary Giveaway

I did not lose myself all at once. I rubbed out my face over the years...the same way carvings on stone are worn down by water.  Amy Tan 

We needn't look far to observe that most very young girls have a strong sense of self or 'I'dentity -- they are connected not just to the world, but to themselves. My friend Rebecca has a daughter who brims with a sense of self; perhaps that's why I find her so winning.  

And why too I can't pull myself away from this Minerva Teichert painting.  

In their jubilant dancing, I see 'I'dentity bursting forth from women who are connected to themselves.

So many of the women that I know work tirelessly to connect to and care for others, to nurture and foster the 'I'dentity of husbands, boyfriends, children, parents, siblings, friends, co-workers, community.  We do so, in large measure, because of our deep connection to and love for God.  

I've observed, however, that we struggle to connect to ourselves.  I think we knew how to at some point, but have forgotten.   

The 'Atta Girl' is meant to help us to remember.

I do what I do each day because of who I am.  Because the good that I do is often difficult to recognize, and to name, it is sometimes hard for others, and even for me, to value my contribution.  As such, there is a grace and elegance to what I do and who I am which is, in fact, changing the world.

Or, in the words of Albert Einstein (shout out to Margaret Sieiro Garcia for flagging), "Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted."

 

Which brings me to the next Random Giveaway -- Every dreamer resolutionary who achieves a score of 70% or better for the two weeks ending January 25 will be eligible to receive a 10" x 7.5" framed print of the above Teichert painting.

P.S. as of 1/28 -- the winner is Kathy L.  Congratulations Kathy!

If you are still scratching your head about my reasoning behind the Atta G'I'rl, you may want to check out the below posts: 

Affirming our 'I'dentity

Throw down your pom-poms

Martha and Mary

Identity crisis

Thank heaven for little Rachels

When our loved ones ask 'what about me?'

Valuing what women do

Looking for the 'I' in the Twilight Series

***

Resolutionary challenge

Bittersweet.

That's how the fall/winter months are for me. I love the fall foliage, Thanksgiving, Christmas, snow days, and skiing, but when the days are so short, life feels a bit more difficult than when the days are long.

Which is why I was so happy to participate in Heather Staker's 2008 Resolutionary Challenge. Resolutionary not only helped me shed a few pounds, it also helped head off my winter blues. Because Heather doesn't have the bandwidth to run this year's Challenge (her 4th child is imminent), and because I wanted to lose a few more pounds and to once again bid the blues good-bye, she's kindly agreed to let me helm the 2009 Resolutionary Challenge in her stead.

Source: Wikipedia

The ground rules are:

1. Start date is Monday, January 12; we'll go for 12 weeks, and end on April 5.

2. Contribute $20 into the Resolutionary Challenge Fund by January 12.

3. A maximum of 10 points can be earned daily, 70 points weekly, 840 over 12 weeks.

4. Beginning January 12, record your points in an online spreadsheet to be circulated by Jan 12.

5. There are two categories of winners:

• The three participants with the most points. 80% of the cash in the Challenge Fund will be divided among the three resolutionaries with the most points. For example, if there is $500 in the kitty, $400 will be allocated amongst the three players with the most points.
• All participants with more than 505 points, or 60% of the available points. Because the Resolutionary Challenge is partly about getting the most points, but mostly about process, any person who gets an average of 6 points or better per day, will have won, and will be eligible for a random giveaway which will be funded by the remaining 20% in the Challenge Fund.

6. Points are earned for the following activities:

• Sleep 7 hrs/per night (Naps can take up the slack)
  
• Drink 64 oz. water
  
• Exercise 30 minutes
• Be ready to present myself to the world by 11am
• Eat 3 servings of fruit/2 servings of vegetables
  
• Savor up to (1) small treat/per day
  
• Take 15 minutes just for me (e.g. read a book  for fun, for meditation, contemplation of the divine, take a walk, watch a TV show)
  
• Finish eating by 9pm
  
• Pay an unsolicited compliment (This is the Wild Card for Week One)
• Say the below "Atta Girl" out loud.

I do what I do each day because of who I am.  Because the good that I do is often difficult to recognize, and to name, it is sometimes hard for others, and even for me, to value my contribution.  As such, there is a grace and elegance to what I do and who I am which is, in fact, changing the world.

Are you ready to be a resolutionary?

If you are, click on this PayPal button and pay the entry fee; it's going to show up as $25 ($20 + $5 for shipping). Because I couldn't fix the glitch, and everyone to date has put in $25 it just makes the pot bigger!  If you don't want to open a PayPal account, let me know -- we'll figure out an alternative arrangement.  In the meantime, here's the button:

Thirteen days until kick off..

Low-hanging fruit and hiatus

Dear all -- 

I'm going on hiatus for a time, but wanted to share a few thoughts prior:

1.  Saying our name - Some of you commented for the first time -- truly appreciated.  Just a couple more thoughts on names/identity:

• For those of you who have purchased a domain name for yourself and/or your children or spouse, how do you feel?  
• Though I'm not a Hillary Clinton fan, in the context of this discussion, I found the article Clinton prepares to relinquish her independence rather poignant.
• If you need to be naming a baby a baby any time soon, check out What a Lovely Name which helps you select a name by traits.  You name the trait -- strength or elegance or brilliance - this website names the name.
• One of my football-following friends shared with me that the football player Chad Johnson changed his name to Chad Ocho Cinco, the number on his jersey.  This is no doubt partly a marketing ploy, but doesn't it also signal that his identity is largely wrapped up in his being a football player?  

• Should you want to think further on names/identity, I recommend Spindle's End, a retelling of Sleeping Beauty, by Robin McKinley.  If you need an 'I'dentity book pick-me-up or want to give an 'I'-dentity book Christmas present that is smartly written, this is the book.  'Sleeping Beauty's name-day is the event that sets the plot in motion.

  

2.  Look for the smallest of opportunities to reinforce our 'I' - I don't cook often, but yesterday I baked a German chocolate cake from scratch.  No particular reason.  Just because.  The cake was yummy, but I I enjoyed the baking of the cake, licking the bowl, and seeing the finished product as much as I enjoyed eating the cake.  My experience was reminiscent of sewing dresses for myself as a 9 and 10 year-old; the joy was in my ability to create.

Source:  Flickr  

3.  What to give for Christmas? -- Given the fairly universal drive to economize this Christmas, I wonder if we haven't an unusual opportunity before us.

Last week, I was reading an Eagle Scout tip titled "Not your Ordinary VIP letters" by Elizabeth Scannell. Rather than request letters from the President, Senators and Representative, Ms. Scannell thought back to their family's favorite vacation spots, and "wrote to people her son had encountered in those places. A magician he’d met in Branson, Mo., sent him a letter and a magic trick, while another sent him a lifetime of free show admissions. A cruise ship captain sent several T-shirts and other logo items, as well as a personal letter.  We all know who most people would consider VIPs. The question is, who are the very important persons in your Eagle Scout’s life?"

In our lives?

Our loved ones' lives?

Several days later I came across my journal from 1993.  In it, I had listed several people who were role models to me. Two of them, women, who are just a tad younger than me, continue to be examples  What if I were to send them a note this Christmas telling them why they are role models?

 

Source:  istockphoto

4.  Look for the low-hanging fruit -- As those of us in the North move into a season of dormancy, we may find ourselves letting our dreams also lie dormant.  There is something to be said for letting dreams lie fallow.  I wonder though if there isn't some low-hanging fruit related to our dream even in this season of quiet?

 

Source:  istockphoto

Saying our name

Can you say your name?  Or would you rather stay unknown?  Stevie Wonder

When I voted this week, the poll worker looked up at me and said, 

"Whitney Johnson -- what a pretty name."

I get that compliment with some frequency, but I didn't use to.

When I was about ten, my parents were late to pick me up from the library.  After calling and asking the librarian to tell me they'd be late, not realizing I was within earshot, she said, 'Whitney -- what kind of a name is that?"

Not too many days later, I launched a 'Call Me Suzanne' campaign, complete with signage on my closet door. As you may have surmised, the campaign was a bust.  Everyone continues to call me Whitney, or some derivative thereof.

Sticks and bones may break my bones, but names....

You remember the rest of the couplet.

Patently untrue, isn't it?

Any words that people use to name us, or more generally speaking, to label us, deeply affect our identity.

In the The Zookeeper's Wife, Diane Ackerman's non-fiction work about one of the most successful hideouts during World War II, shares the following:

Polish emigre Eva Hoffman, writes movingly about the psychic earthquake of having to shed her name:   'Nothing much has happened, except a small, seismic mental shift.  The twist in our names takes them a tiny distance from us -- but it is a gap into which the infinite hobgoblin of abstraction enters.'  Suddenly her given name and her sister's no longer existed, even though 'they were as surely us as our eyes or hands.'  And the new names were 'identification tags, disembodied signs pointing to objects that happen to be my sister and myself.  We walk to our seats, into a roomful of unknown faces, with names that makes us strangers to ourselves.'

Our name, our identity -- our who we are.

How do we feel when someone remembers our name?  When someone calls us by name?  When someone asks us to link to them on LinkedIn with a personal note?

Many have credited Bill Clinton's remarkable political success to his interpersonal intelligence, his ability to read people, to remember their names.  I wouldn't be surprised if many feel the same about Barack Obama.

And what of the labels we affix to others?

Every day we see something impressive or magnificent in those around us. Some we know well, some we don't.  Do we tell them what we think?  Do we give them the gift of our words, helping to make their identity less abstract, more concrete?

If we were to put a slight twist on the names or labels we currently give to people, what kind of mental seismic shift might occur?  For them?  for us?

Sticks and stones may break our bones, but names...

...will always help us?  Heal us?

Much better.

What is your name?  Do you like it?   Do people use your name?  If you are a woman and married, and took on the name of your husband, how did your identity shift?  What about the other labels that make up your identity?

Have you reinforced your identity by purchasing your domain name?  If it's too expensive to buy www.annjohnson.com because someone already owns it, why not buy annjjohnson.com?

Have you bought domain names for your children?  Instead of buying stock or savings bonds for their next birthday, why not buy them domain names?

Have you named your dream?

Which secret garden will we tend?

Both abundance and lack exist simultaneously in our lives, as parallel realities; it is always our conscious choice which secret garden we will tend.  Sarah Ban Breathnach

Several months ago, I was on a business trip in California.

We had met with interesting and influential people, accomplished what we'd hoped to, and I couldn't ask for better business partners.  It was a perfect business trip until... 

Until a chance conversation with someone I'd known as a child.

And in the space of moment, my capable, in control-of-my-world adult self had dissolved; I was again a young girl who felt incompetent, fearful, and out-of-control.

I was undone, and terribly sad.

As I tried to make meaning of what had happened, talking it through with several of my trusted friends, it became clear I was going to have to choose how I would remember, or frame, this snippet of time.

Yes -- I'd had several hours of profound sadness and loss.  But hadn't this unexpected juxtaposition of my childhood and adult self allowed me to see my trajectory -- to see who I've become?

Was the trip a disaster?  A success?  Both?

My choice -- my secret garden.  

Source:  istockphoto

And what of our current economic environment, and its impact on our net present value?

Nearly all of us are worth less today than we were six months ago.   But isn't it good to have a legitimate reason for belt-tightening, for teaching our children to prioritize.  Relatively few children in the developed world have any sense of what it's like to scrabble and scrape, to really hunger after opportunity.

Is our forced floundering a disaster?  A success?  Both?

Our choice.

There's a marvelous quote by Martha Beck, in O magazine which I'd like to share with you.  I'm ambivalent about her because she's spoken so negatively about my faith... but in the context of this post, it would be a disservice to us all to not share what she's written.    

Does toughness borne of regret look like unreachable bitterness or unstoppable resilience; does your tenderness look like the raw vulnerability of a never-healing wound, or a kindness so deep it heals every wound it touches.

Are our difficulties disasters, successes?  Both?

Our choice -- our secret garden.

What are you going through that is difficult?   Or have gone through?  How are you framing this experience?   If a disaster, where's the success?

In what areas of your life are you unstoppably resilient?  What experience did you have that helped you develop this resilience?

In what areas of your life, or to whom, is your kindness so deep, it heals every wound it touches?  What experience fostered that kindness?

P.S.  Several of you have mentioned that you have thoughts, but don't want to share them in a public forum -- I hope you will.  If you don't feel comfortable doing so, please let me know what I can do to make this feel like a safe place?  In the meantime, perhaps you can post anonymously.

Living the dream. Life's a breeze. Not.

During a particularly challenging week at work, I happened upon an article by Robert S. Kaplan titled Reaching your Potential which offered up the teaser, "maybe you feel frustrated with your career--convinced you should be achieving more. You may even wish you had chosen a different career altogether."

I was definitely frustrated, and even discouraged, but did I wish I had chosen a different path?

Not really.

As I reflected on Kaplan's article, I realized that I'm right where I want to be.

In sharing this insight with one of my friends, she kindly, but pointedly asked,

"Did you really think that living your dream isn't challenging, discouraging, and difficult?"

To which I sheepishly replied, "No."

The truth is there's a pretty large shred of me which believes that in living my dream, life will be breezy.

This isn't, and can't be, true -- am I the only one who wants it to be?

Do you remember Psyche's 3rd task?

The task that requires her to fill a flask with water from a raging river alongside a craggy cliff, a task which is a metaphor for our learning to accomplish goals against inevitable distractions and tough odds.

This image is copyrighted by Mallika Sundaramurthy and Whitney Johnson, 2008.

Would it be accurate to say that Psyche didn't choose to be on the hero's journey? That she wasn't precisely where she wanted and needed to be? That she didn't want to accomplish her goal?

No, no and no.

But it was difficult.

It is for us too.

After one of your tough days, do you find yourself wondering if you really are living your dream? If you're not -- then that is another conversation. If you are, do you ask why things aren't easier? Why do you think we believe this?

Did you notice how Psyche delegated the task of filling the flask to the eagle? As we are dreaming, whether our dream involves full-time mothering, full-time careering, or some amalgam of the two, what tasks can we delegate?

If you were to interview dare to dreamgirl Dana King, who recently started designHop clubs, and has been featured in St. Louis Magazine, will she tell you she is happily living out her dream? Absolutely. Will she tell you it's easy? I'll let you ask her.

Or if you were to interview Rebecca Nielsen, the mother of young twin daughters, who recently wrote about Rightsizing our dream, what will she say? Easy? Hard? Both?

Related posts:
The Myth of Psyche
Psyche's 3rd Task
Second thoughts on Psyche's 2nd task
dare to dreamgirl: Dana King
Sucker punch