Donald Miller's Blog, page 38

A Way to Have Conversations That Will Lead to Deeper Relationships

When I was a mama of three very tiny, very messy, very beautiful rug rats, we had DAYS THAT WENT ON FOR LIFETIMES.

Craig left at 6:00 am every morning and as I watched his showered, ironed self leave the house I felt incredibly blessed and thrilled to have so much time alone with my babies and incredibly terrified and bitter to have so much time alone with my babies.

If you don’t believe that all of those feelings can exist at once—well, you’ve never been a parent to many tiny, messy, beautiful rug rats.

When Craig returned each day at 6:00 pm (he actually returned at 5:50 but took a STUNNINGLY LONG TIME TO GET THE MAIL) he’d walk through the door, smile, and say—

“So! How was your day?”

This question was like a spotlight pointed directly at the chasm between his experience of a “DAY” and my experience of a “DAY.” How was my day?

The question would linger in the air for a moment while I stared at Craig and the baby shoved her hand in my mouth like they do—while the oldest screamed MOMMY I NEED HELP POOING from the bathroom and the middle one cried in the corner because I NEVER EVER EVER let her drink the dishwasher detergent. NOT EVER EVEN ONCE, MOMMY!!!

And I’d look down at my spaghetti stained pajama top, unwashed hair, and gorgeous baby on my hip—and my eyes would wander around the room, pausing to notice the toys peppering the floor and the kids’ stunning new art on the fridge . . .

And I’d want to say: How was my day?

Today has been a lifetime.

It was the best of times and the worst of times. There were moments when my heart was so full I thought I might explode, and there were other moments when my senses were under such intense assault that I was CERTAIN I’d explode.

I was both lonely and absolutely desperate to be alone.

Photo Credit: Marina Aguiar, Creative Commons

I was saturated—just BOMBARDED with touch and then the second I put down this baby I yearned to smell her sweet skin again.

I was simultaneously bored out of my skull and completely overwhelmed with so much to do.

Today was too much and not enough. It was loud and silent. It was brutal and beautiful. I was at my very best today and then, just a moment later, at my very worst.

At 3:30 today I decided that we should adopt four more children, and then at 3:35 I decided that we should give up the kids we already have for adoption.

Husband—when your day is completely and totally dependent upon the moods and needs and schedules of tiny, messy, beautiful rug rats your day is ALL OF THE THINGS and NONE OF THE THINGS, sometimes within the same three minute period.

But I’m not complaining.

This is not a complaint, so don’t try to FIX IT.

I wouldn’t have my day Any.Other.Way. I’m just saying—it’s a hell of a hard thing to explain—an entire day with lots of babies.

But I’d be too tired to say all of that. So I’d just cry, or yell, or smile and say “fine,” and then hand the baby over and run to Target to wander aisles aimlessly, because that’s all I ever really wanted.

But I’d be a little sad because love is about really being seen and known and I wasn’t being seen or known then. Everything was really hard to explain. It made me lonely.

So we went went to therapy, like we do.

Through therapy, we learned to ask each other better questions. We learned that if we really want to know our people, if we really care to know them—we need to ask them better questions and then really listen to their answers.

We need to ask questions that carry along with them this message: “I’m not just checking the box here. I really care what you have to say and how you feel. I really want to know you.”

If we don’t want throw away answers, we can’t ask throw away questions. A caring question is a key that will unlock a room inside the person you love.

So Craig and I don’t ask “how was your day?” anymore.

After a few years of practicing increasingly intimate question asking, now we find ourselves asking each other questions like these:

When did you feel loved today?
When did you feel lonely?
What did I do today that made you feel appreciated?
What did I say that made you feel unnoticed?
What can I do to help you right now?

I know. WEEEEEIRRD at first. But not after a while. Not any weirder than asking the same damn empty questions you’ve always asked that illicit the same damn empty answers you’ve always gotten.

And so now when our kids get home from school, we don’t  say: “How was your day?” Because they don’t know. Their day was lots of things.

Instead we ask our kids:

How did you feel during your spelling test?
What did you say to the new girl when you all went out to recess?
Did you feel lonely at all today?
Where there any times you felt proud of yourself today?
Third Item
Third Item

And I never ask my friends: How are you?

Because they don’t know either.

Instead I ask:

How is your mom’s chemo going?
How’d that conference with Ben’s teacher turn out?
What’s going really well with work right now?

Questions are like gifts.

It’s the thought behind them that the receiver really FEELS. We have to know the receiver to give the right gift and to ask the right question.

Generic gifts and questions are all right, but personal gifts and questions feel better. Love is specific, I think. It’s an art. The more attention and time you give to your questions, the more beautiful the answers become.

Life is a conversation. Make it a good one.

A Way to Have Conversations That Will Lead to Deeper Relationships is a post from: Storyline Blog

Why So Many People Are Wasting Their Potential

I often get the feeling I am not reaching my full potential as a writer and a creative person.

Do you know what I mean?

It’s not for a lack of trying.

I am up most mornings at 5am, working hard to crank out blog content before I even get started on the work that actually pays me money. I’m often up until 10 or 11:00pm, tweaking last minute changes and making sure everything is ready to go for the next day.

And at the end of it all, I usually feel like I’ve spent every last bit of creative energy I have and I still haven’t done everything I’m capable of doing.

I want to produce something of real value but I’m just not quite doing it.

The other day I was talking to Don, asking him for advice about writing, and I asked him what mistake he sees young creative people making when it comes to their careers.

He said something that really surprised me.

He said, “If you want to write books, why are you spending so much time writing long Instagram posts?”

That stopped me in my tracks.

He was right. I do spend a lot of time writing long Instagram captions. An embarrassing amount of time, actually. After he said that, I started paying attention to how much time it actually was and realized he was right. It was too much.

At first, my response was defensive. I told myself:

“I have to spend time on Instagram if I want to grow my platform…”

It was an easy defense to take. After all, it is sort of true. But the problem was that wasn’t the real reason I was spending so much time writing tweets, Instagram captions and Facebook posts.

The real reason, I realized, is I get instant gratification when I share my writing on social media. I get likes and comments—which I don’t get when I sit down to the daunting task of writing a book.

Writing a book is long, lonely, hard work.

I’m reading a book called On Managing Yourself from the Harvard Business Review. It’s a collection of essays and the first essay in the book is by Clayton M Christensen. He says, when it comes to maximizing your creative talent:

If You’re not guided by a clear sense of purpose, you’re likely to fritter away your time and energy on obtaining the most tangible, short-term signs of achievement, not what’s really important to you.

The problem with wasting too much time writing Instagram captions, aside from the fact that it doesn’t pay my bills, is that that it isn’t congruent with my long term goals.

If we want to do creative work that lives beyond us, we have to start giving our creative energy to things that are sustainable and lasting—even if they don’t give immediate results.

It’s not that we stop posting articles online or even writing Instagram posts completely.

We simply have to be very intentional about how we’re spending our creative energies. Storyline Blog

Why Feeling Sorry For Yourself Makes You Destined to Fail

I’ve a friend who can’t hold a job. He’s actually had some great jobs, but he can’t keep them. And for each job he’s lost, he has a story about how bad his boss was, what an idiot he was, and how hard he was to work with.

I’m sure my friends bosses have had some issues, but as I listened to him, I realized how hard it would be to have an employee like my friend. I mean, to have to supervise a guy who was, at the start, against you—looking for faults, looking for reasons to not be a team player.

My friend won’t take responsibility for his own issues.

He assumes he doesn’t have any. The truth is my friend is destined to fail, and continue failing, until he understands that what he really wants in life is to be a victim, and he’s looking for any opportunity to become one.

That’s a cheap way of getting attention, and my friend will never be happy until he gives it up and starts taking responsibility for his life.

My friend Josh Ship, on the other hand is a speaker who goes around talking to large groups of teenagers.

He is, perhaps, the greatest communicator I know. Even in my thirties, I watch all the little videos he puts out at www.heyjosh.com.

Josh is an unlikely candidate to have become such a success.

He grew up in more than twenty foster families. He never knew his mother or his father. That fundamental need we all have as humans to be loved and cared for, Josh never received.

And yet he inspires millions.

I asked Josh once how he does it, how he remains so healthy. Josh said:

You either get bitter or you get better. It’s that simple. You either take what has been dealt to you and allow it to make you a better person, or you allow it to tear you down. The choice does not belong to fate, it belongs to you.

There will always be a reason to feel sorry for ourselves. And sometimes it really is appropriate to grieve something terrible that has happened in our lives. But we also have to move on, we have to set ourselves free from the trap of self pity.

If you are like me, the reason you sometimes feel sorry for yourself is because it feels good.

I know that sounds odd, but if you think about it, it really does.

When I feel sorry for myself, what I’m really saying is that I deserved better, that I am a better person than what the situation has dealt me. And if you think about it, that’s kind of an arrogant thing to say.

It would be better if our attitude was more like, man, that stinks, I didn’t get that job or that girl rejected me, better luck next time.

Or we could just laugh about it with our friends.

The trouble comes when something hard happens, and we chose to stop and milk it for attention. There’s no progress in that, and it isn’t going to get us anywhere. And it’s also annoying.

When a person goes to the gym to work out, they aren’t building up their muscles.

They are tearing them down. No kidding. When you lift weights, you are doing damage to your muscles. The reason your muscles grow, then, is because your body goes into repair the damaged muscles, and makes them bigger so the next time you lift that much weight, you wont get hurt.

So then you just lift more weights, and your body gets stronger and stronger.

It’s like that with our emotions, too. Once we experience something hard, it tears us down.It really does hurt, doesn’t it?

We screw up and embarrass ourselves or we lose a job and don’t have any money. But honestly, there is nothing bad that can happen to us that won’t return a greater blessing if we let it. We will always come out stronger.

And believe me, life is going to throw a lot of pain at you.

What self-pity does, though, is it stops us from gaining that emotional muscle. It’s almost like we can either have the blessing of a stronger character, or the immediate gratification of self pity. But not both.

People who wallow in self-pity, never grow strong in character.

What we have to do instead is ask ourselves what we can learn from the situation.

If we got rejected by the opposite sex, we have to ask ourselves why.

Is there anything we can do differently? If we got fired, we have to take ownership of whatever we did that was wrong. And if it wasn’t our fault, we have to understand that the rain falls on the good and the bad, and crops only grow out of ground that has been rained upon.

I have to check myself all the time for thoughts of self-pity.

Now I’d never consider myself somebody who feels sorry for himself. In fact I detest the idea, because I know how unattractive it is.

And yet, nearly every day, I find myself complaining about something.

And complaining is nothing but self pity.

If I complain about the flat tire on my truck, I’m really saying I’m somebody who deserves better. How arrogant of me, right? Instead, I need to get out of the truck and change the tire and move on, just dealing with the rain as it comes.

If you want to be successful some day, stop complaining. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. It’s not worth it. Take the opportunities you have to grow.

Why Feeling Sorry For Yourself Makes You Destined to Fail is a post from: Storyline Blog

5 Articles I Sent My Staff This Week

As a staff, we are committed to learning and growing, both professionally and personally. One of the ways we do that is by reading. Below are some of the most current things we’re reading together.

If you’re in need of something great to read this weekend, start here. Storyline Blog

Can Racism Be Solved Through Friendship?

Recently I have had the honor of sitting at a table with a diverse group of women for the sole purpose of talking about racism, culture, privilege, and reconciliation.

These words within the last year have filled social media posts and fueled worldwide-trending hashtags.

So a few of us gathered at a table to listen to each other’s stories, learn how these words affect us, and how can we personally and collectively heal, stand for justice, and live in peace.

As the headlines and viral news videos tell stories of beatings, deaths, riots, and protests, it can be overwhelming to know not only how to process the information and experiences there but how to find hope and peace in the midst of everything.

When I sit at the table with these women it doesn’t solve racism.

It doesn’t change discrimination or put an end to ignorance, but as we talk and get to know each other, it changes us.

As we listen to each other, look into each other’s eyes, view the beauty of each other’s various skin tones, our biases and prejudices are forced to change. Through our time at the table, we learn to really see and hear each other, to empathize with each other’s experiences, to admit what we don’t know or don’t understand, to humble ourselves.

Ignorance, prejudice, and many societal ills in our world can begin to change through relationship. Storyline Blog

Couples Who Stay Together Follow This One Rule

Now and then, a young couple comes to me for pre-marital counseling.

Over the years, I’ve tried to come up with a few things to talk about that might be meaningful and interesting. I do this somewhat reluctantly, knowing full well they’re so ga-ga about one another, there is only a slim chance they’ll remember anything I say.

Photo Credit: Sean McGrath, Creative Commons

They usually cuddle and hug while fairy dust sprinkles around their naïve little heads.

This is why there is a Dustbuster behind my couch.

Even so, I try to talk a little about issues that might come up down the road in their marriage. We explore their stories, their families, and the uniqueness of their upbringing. Eventually, I steer the conversation toward their understanding of conflict.

This is where it can get interesting. (Insert evil laugh here.)

I ask them to tell me what they learned about the art of conflict based on what they observed in their homes in their youth.

It’s a fascinating exercise and some interesting observations come out of it.

Some have never seen their parents argue.

Others lived in the midst of rage and chaos. Some felt the quiet tension of passive aggressive behavior, while others heard screams and dishes breaking as they hid in the closet. And many experienced something in between.

A few actually had healthy models where they witnessed their parents contending with issues as they moved toward resolve.

Underline the words a few.

I could write a book about the different ways people do conflict and suggestions on how to do it better. But remember, in this particular situation (with a young couple), they aren’t going to remember much.

Thus I say one thing about conflict, hoping against hope that it sticks to the walls of their cupid infused brains. And here is that one thing:

If an argument crosses over from anger to contempt, it needs to stop immediately.

Let me tell you what I mean.

Conflict and arguments are both inevitable and necessary in a marriage. Storyline Blog

Uncertainty About Your Future Might Actually Be Okay

I feel bad for graduates. It’s that time of year: caps, gowns, diplomas, and those troubling questions:

“What’s next?”

“Where are you headed?”

“Do you have a plan?”

Photo Credit: Will Folsom, Creative Commons

The questions themselves are not bad and the people who ask them are generally well intentioned. Yet one of the great lies that haunts our culture is the notion that we are supposed to have a clearly articulable and reasonably specific plan for our futures.

If we don’t, something is wrong with us.

Our culture celebrates certainty and laments ambiguity.

College students quickly learn that it is better to “declare” a major and “proclaim” allegiance to a profession than to “admit” at the ripe old age of 18 or 22 that they do not have a fully formed strategic plan for their lives.

This pattern doesn’t end at commencement.

Most young people never imagine their middle age with uncertainty or their old age with options. I hear the awkward angst and uncomfortable guilt surrounding uncertainty from mid-career professionals seeking more meaningful work, parents pondering an empty nest, and those wondering how to spend their retirement years.

Most recently my lovely wife and I were pondering these same questions.

Where we would live, what schools should our kids attend, and how do we juggle the persistent struggles and joys attendant with the work we love. She said, “I thought by now we would be more settled.” I answered honestly, “Me too.”

Together we were wondering, “What is next?”

I think the Scriptures call us “wanderers” and “sojourners” for a reason. Even the most contented among us are regularly confronted with unexpected changes throughout our lives.

The notion that our futures should be neatly ordered can create frustration and insecurity when we inevitably return to the intersection of decision.

How many of us could have accurately predicted ten years ago where we would be today, who we would be with, and what tasks would fill our schedules?

My forecast ten years ago would have been wrong in so many ways: the number of children I have, who employs me, the continent I live on, or the existence of smart phones.

These changes were not even on my radar screen.

Ten years ago many of my friends were not thinking about the joys of marriage, adoption, college visits, or long-term care insurance. Nor were they thinking about the challenging effects of divorce, recovery, bankruptcy, or cancer.

Unexpected difficulties, opportunities, and friendships sometimes unfold when we least expect them.

If you have a clear vision of your future, enjoy this season.

It will not likely last.

For the graduates (and the uncertain majority of people) whose future paths are dimly lit, take encouragement that figuring it out is often a refining process. It is both normal and acceptable not to always know what is next.

An uncertain path is not an excuse for inaction, but a motivation to keep us questioning, thinking, learning, and growing.

It also requires a healthy dose of humility because we are not in control.

Pick some great people to join you on the ups and downs of life’s journey. With principled goals and intentional hard work, forge ahead on your evolving path. As Soren Kierkegaard said, “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”

Uncertainty About Your Future Might Actually Be Okay is a post from: Storyline Blog

How to Make Complicated Problems Very Simple

Last week Betsy and I took our first vacation since our Honeymoon and it was great. We rented a convertible and drove up the California coast, stopping each night to stay with friends. The sunshine was incredible, the wine was terrific and the conversations were great.

The only problem was the water. And it’s a big problem.

Of course I’m talking about the drought in California.

In Santa Barbara, we stayed at a friend’s house he’d built on the foundation of another house that had burned down a few years ago in a terrible fire. And fire danger is still at an unprecedented high.

At restaurants along the coast, nobody brings water to you unless you ask.

Many businesses will lose significant investments they’ve made in landscaping; and city parks may be allowed to brown under the hot, dry sun.

And worst of all, as we ate with Rice, Almond and Walnut farmers in northern California, they told about how they’re having to play their part and only harvest 50% of the land they’d normally harvest.

Of course, everybody is having to do their part and everybody is sacrificing.

What matters most about California’s plan to survive this drought, then, is that everybody understands the plan. Can you imagine having to communicate with that many millions of people what each persons’ role is in staving off a greater crisis?

Photo Credit: Mark Roy, Creative Commons

Late last year 4 key players from the state of California flew to see us in Nashville to work on their communication plan.

As we met, we talked about how important it is that they speak clearly, simply and definitively as they tell the story of the crisis. And we’re proud to say they came through. Gov. Jerry Brown announced the plan last week and, top to bottom, it’s true to the StoryBrand 7-part framework.

It’s a complicated issue communicated very simply.

As you learn to communicate that critical message you’ve got burning inside you, you can learn a thing or two from the players in California.

Below, I’ll link to their web-based communication, but for now, here are seven major paradigm shifts we guided them through.

They work in any form of communication. I hope they help you too.

Make sure you frame the reader, customer, donor or voter as the hero. You—the writer, the speaker, the company, the organization—are never the hero.
Play the role of guide for the hero. Let your company, brand or organization assist the customer in winning the day. Give them the key information, encouragement or resources they need.
Define the problem clearly. Don’t use vague language. Keep it short and simple.
Define the solution clearly. Again, don’t use vague language. Paint a picture of what the world could look like if your solution was accepted.
Let each person know their role in the struggle to achieve success. Give them ownership.
Call the customer to action. People won’t take action unless they are asked to. Make the Call to Action clear.
Let people know the consequences of not taking action. Without knowing the consequences, there’s no tension in the story.

The StoryBrand framework works.

We’ve taught these paradigm shifts to Fortune 500 companies, life coaches, plumbers and pastors. The principles are universal. They are working well in the campaign in California and we’re ecstatic to have played a part in preserving that beautiful state.

If you’ve got a message you’re dying to tell and need help clarifying it, register for one of our Nashville workshops today.

Read more about the California’s water effort HERE.

How to Make Complicated Problems Very Simple is a post from: Storyline Blog

How Do So Many Good People Get Away With Bad Things?

A couple weeks ago I watched a documentary called Happy Valley about the recent controversy surrounding the Penn State football program. It’s a terribly sad story, mostly centering around former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky having molested and raped many young boys he recruited through his program for at-risk kids called The Second Mile.

The documentary aims to objectively show the ramifications of coach Sandusky’s actions on an entire community, and especially on a football program that prides itself in excellence, character and discipline.

Character after character in the drama attempted to separate the program and the community from the actions of one man.

But the nagging question throughout the entire documentary was implied:

How did one man get away with such evil deeds?

Especially since, for years, quiet rumors were spreading and witnesses had even caught him in the act in the locker-room shower. Yet for ten more years, Sandusky had free reign over all Penn State facilities.

Especially troubling in the documentary was the story of Jerry’s own adopted son, Matt.

Matt, older now and with a wife and children, defended his father against the accusations all the way up to the trial. Finally, as more and more evidence loomed, he came forward. Sandusky had recruited, brainwashed and adopted him, in part, as a sex toy.

Once Matt made his story known, nobody in the Sandusky family spoke with him again. This remains true to this day.

So how do people like this get away with it?

I think for many reasons.

The powerful tribal dynamics of college football play an obvious part. But this story is nothing new.

I want to shine light on yet another reason and as sick as it sounds, it’s this:

Jerry Sandusky did a lot of good deeds.

He actually rescued young, neglected kids. He changed lives. He quoted the Bible. He was known as a man of prayer and a deeply religious man. Before he was caught, he’d do interviews promoting his organization and nearly come to tears talking about the needs of the underprivileged kids in the community.

So, how did he get away with it for so long?

Easy. He posed as a hero.

It’s easy for people to believe somebody is evil, but once they’re convinced a person is good, moral, heroic, then you’re asking the public to admit they were wrong about them. And that’s hard for the public to do.

As a pastor friend recently told me:

“Don, individuals are smart but crowds are dumb.”

In my day, I’ve met more than a few religious leaders who get away with near criminal activity because the masses are convinced they are saints.

It’s nearly impossible to believe that people who talk so much about Jesus, who’ve led so many to Christ and who position themselves (and are perhaps in a strange way even quite sincere) as followers of Jesus also commit emotional abuse on their staff, spiritual abuse on their followers, financial gymnastics with ministry funds and so on and so on all under the cover of their “good deeds.”

So how do we know if somebody is safe or full of it?

Here are some signs of unsafe leaders:

1. They have a track record of burned bridges. People who are publicly heroic but privately dastardly rely on convincing a revolving cohort of associates they are the real thing. Until, of course, the new cohort figures it out. Then they’re run off or they step away quietly. The manipulator doesn’t care, of course. He or she is in the business of leading the masses through acting, not individuals through actual care.

2. They do not admit their mistakes. Manipulative leaders have way too much to lose to let them know they’ve got chinks in their armor. If they have to admit to something, it will be vague. But they will not admit they are wrong about anything specific. They will not, ever, reconcile with those they’ve wronged. They don’t care. Again, they are playing to the masses because that’s were the power is. They want an army of strangers to defend them.

3. They want control at all costs. If they have a board of directors, they will all be submissive or they will be run off. Nobody can question their righteousness because if they do, the whole thing will unravel. They do not have people in authority over them because if they did, they could not hide their manipulation and deception. They are top dog, always.

4. When caught, they play the victim. Manipulators are manipulators through and through. When caught, they vaguely apologize but very quickly spin the narrative so it looks like they are the righteous victims who, at most, made a small mistake and are being crucified for it. Once again, they use this tactic to corral the masses to go to war for them. The true victims, of course, are forgotten in the drama. All the attention goes to the manipulator, which is how they want it.

Mostly, though, we can use our intuition.

If someone seems too good to be true, they probably are. Storyline Blog

The Side of Motherhood I Did Not Know

For some of us, the word mother is warm and welcoming. For others, a bitter memory or longing. Or maybe both. Whatever it may be, whatever came after the first breath, we all started with her—our mother.

The one who carried us, who actually grew us, who knew us before anyone else.

A year ago, I sat in my bed and I thought of my own mother, wondering how in the world she managed to raise three when I was wondering how I was going to raise two. I thought about how we waited six years to have a baby—the struggle, heartache, the surrender of it all. How we tried adoption but it fell though.

Then finally, a baby.

So I sat there in our bed, staring at my almost eight month belly, awaiting the arrival of our second. I was on partial bed rest because she wasn’t gaining weight, so I was pounding down Denver’s own Little Man ice cream…with a side of donut.

Photo Credit: Philippe Put, Creative Commons

Though I hadn’t seen her yet, I could see her. Though I had not held her yet, my arms felt her.

I now fully listen when someone speaks of their own sorrow.

I don’t try to offer some cliché phrase or bustle ahead in my day. Because this thing called motherhood has taught me that in this life, the fight matters right along with the joy of it. Being a mom has changed me at my core. I know I will mess up, and I know I will succeed – both many times over. I will heal the wounds when I can, I will recklessly love, and I will fight for my girl like a fierce mother does.

About an hour after the nurse told us our girl had Down Syndrome, Michael walked beside the bed and asked everyone to leave the room. His face swollen with tears, he placed his hand on my stomach and said:

“For You created her inmost being; you knit her together in her mother’s womb…she is fearfully and wonderfully made…”

I broke, and we both just sobbed together.

I have never felt love in such an insurmountable force than I did in that moment. If you were standing in that hospital room, you would have felt it too—something holy. Like some Other was with us, putting breath back into our lungs, hope to heart. Something like a mother. Holding her children tight, seeing us vulnerable and weak, and stitching our wounds back together.

The Side of Motherhood I Did Not Know is a post from: Storyline Blog