The Courage to Be.

In 1975, my next door neighbor Paul was a very famous architect, a graduate of Harvard, the University of Berlin, and the Bauhaus. He was in his 70s and an avid skier. He was a handsome man in great shape and with a lively mind. I had seen his homes in books of modern architecture.

I would go visit him frequently. He asked to borrow my books about Wittgenstein. We loved to sit and talk philosophy and modern design. I liked to play on his tennis court. My wife and I took care of his chickens when he and his young Chinese wife traveled. They lived in an old New England farmhouse that had been added onto time after time. It was an architectural mess. He was an architectural marvel. And he was my favorite unofficial mentor.

But then we had to move out of the one bedroom "mother in law" apartment in the big house where we lived outside New Haven. The husband of the family owning the home had disappeared for a year, only to show up one day in a crazy disguise. I didn't recognize him at all, but his kids yelled out "Daddy!" Weeks later, men in dark suits and Ford LTDs arrived to take boxes of things out of his part of the home. And soon, we had to move a mile away.

I later heard that Paul had been diagnosed with cancer. I tried to figure out what to say to him before I visited. I couldn't come up with anything. I was afraid to visit without good words for him. I thought I had to have answers. I postponed seeing him. I procrastinated. I was busy. I was in graduate school at Yale. I thought of him often, and put off what I thought would be a very awkward visit to a man who had been so full of life. Then someone told me he had died. Waiting for words was one of the worst mistakes I had ever made.

Don't wait for words. Don't wait for answers. Go to people in need and just show you care, words or not. People need love more than answers. People need you.

Sorry, Paul. I was an idiot. Actually, I was a coward. But I didn't understand that at all. I do now. And I've developed a little more courage, the essential courage to just go forth and be. I don’t have to have all the answers. But I do have this one. And now, all these years later. I have the courage to admit my weakness and to say thanks for the lesson. I still love you, man. I finally realize what it takes to show that to others.

Sponge-Worthy Morning Thoughts

Fear is not typically your friend. Anxiety isn't your best advisor. Hang out instead with hope and courage for your finest path forward.

My dreams bring me issues I need to address, and most often in a very creative form. I've learned to pay attention.

The thing about Socrates that most stands out to me was his courage. And I've come to see that as a central quality for any fulfilling life.

Compassion and Courage. What would the world be like if these two qualities led us every day, in equal measure, and applied by wisdom? Let’s bring a little more of each into our lives.

When we cultivate the thought beyond words, we begin to explore a realm of wonder that far exceeds the reach of language.

What if creativity is really your default setting? It could be that you just need to remove some artificial obstacles in order to be your innovative artistic best.

When circumstances squeeze you, it's best not to be a dry sponge. And what you'll give out will be what you've soaked up. Remember that.

Friends can double the good and cut the bad in half. Aristotle understood that it would be difficult to live a great life without friends.

The one external good that's of genuine internal worth is a friend.

Friendship and Forgiveness

Today, I came across some statements from the poet David Whyte that I want to share. In his new book Consolations, he writes this about one of our most important ongoing experiences in life:

Friendship is a mirror to presence and a testament to forgiveness. Friendship not only helps us see ourselves through another’s eyes, but can be sustained over the years only with someone who has repeatedly forgiven us for our trespasses as we must find it in ourselves to forgive them in turn. A friend knows our difficulties and shadows and remains in sight, a companion to our vulnerabilities more than our triumphs, when we are under the strange illusion we do not need them. An undercurrent of real friendship is a blessing exactly because its elemental form is rediscovered again and again through understanding and mercy. All friendships of any length are based on a continued, mutual forgiveness. Without tolerance and mercy all friendships die.

That's a beautiful characterization of an immensely valuable thing in life, whose importance we easily forget. And I want to give you one more passage, because of the deeply wise advice it provides:

To remain friends we must know the other and their difficulties and even their sins and encourage the best in them, not through critique but through addressing the better part of them, the leading creative edge of their incarnation, thus subtly discouraging what makes them smaller, less generous, less of themselves.

Real friends help each other grow. We help our friends best when we encourage the best in them. Sometimes, yes, we need to point out a flaw with that honesty that only true friendship will muster. And it can be effective, when given and received in the right spirit. But more often, we help our friends most by encouraging them to be their best selves, through genuine praise and reinforcement. 

Life is a team sport. Great friends make for great teams.

Friendship is a Garden

Friendship is a garden that needs cultivation and care. There are many forces in the world that will strengthen it, and more that will weaken it. The good gardener understands this and doesn't allow neglect to spoil the beauty of what's been planted and grown.

Friendship is an investment whose returns can rise or fall. If your time and attention were money, whose stock would justify the price? Good investments, of course, benefit both sides. Bad investments ultimately fail everyone involved. Great investments are those that yield dividends for life.

Friendship is an adventure, a shared voyage into the unknown. It's both a journey and the best means that we have to journey well. It's a light that shines in the darkness, a map and compass for the trip. It's a partnership of exploration where guidance and help flows both ways.

Friendship is an enterprise, the building of something new. It's a dynamic structure of work and play with a purpose that, at its best, benefits more than just the friends themselves.

Friendship is a celebration of what's good in life, and a support through all that's hard. It's a sharing of interest, activity, exuberance, and fun. It can also be a sharing of trouble and grief. Friends multiply the good, while dividing the bad.

And so, without friends, Aristotle asked us, who would want to live?

Work in your garden today. Invest. Adventure. Build. Celebrate. And give the sort of support that you most would want to receive.

The Road to Greatness

This week, I've written an earlier blog post on the idea of greatness. A friend read it and told me something interesting. He said that his son had once been at a school where he was surrounded by mediocrity, and then switched to another school in the same town where he encountered the quest for personal greatness, left and right. My friend went on to say that the new, more challenging environment, had a decidedly uplifting effect on his son, right away, and that the results of this got him into a top university, where the level of expected excellence increased again. 

It's amazing how often we've been told by philosophers that we become like the people we're around, and how commonly we forget to use this important truth to our own advantage. During my years at Notre Dame, it astonished me to see that, no matter how good our football team might be, when they played a bad team, they played badly themselves. The sloppiness and mistakes they showed could be truly perplexing to witness. And yet, when they played a top five team, they'd play them toe-to-toe, and often win.

We're so often like thermometers, rising or falling with the temperature around us, and yet we'd prefer to think of ourselves as thermostats, determining it, instead.

There are a lot of deep evolutionary reasons, related to survival, for our unconscious need and drive to fit in with the people around us. We need to be accepted. We need to be liked. And so, below the level of awareness, we conform in many ways. We become like our tribe.

But we also have the gift of free will. And that allows the possibility, within limits, and sometimes even apart from any limits, for us to choose our tribe. Who do we want to hang around? Who do we want to be like? Who do we most admire?

And yet, here's the apparent dilemma: I want to be like people who are a lot better than me. That way, I can grow into my own form of greatness, encouraged by my environment. But if they're at least as smart and ambitious as I am, they'll want to be around people much better than them, which clearly excludes me. Remember Groucho Marx, who said he'd never want to belong to a club that would have someone like him as a member? That's sort of the problem.

But there's the secret. If I want to be around people significantly better than I am in all the right ways, they will be people of great kindness and curiosity - two very different virtues. And yet, either of those qualities will open them up to my company. Problem solved.

So, why not aim for the stars? The real stars, I mean, not the fake, manufactured ones. When we associate with people of real wisdom and virtue, real accomplishment and knowledge, we're encouraged in our own adventures with greatness. The path is much easier.

Why, then, should we ever settle for less?