Charles Gupton

Relationships

Are You Burning Your Fuel Wisely?

“Do not fall in love with people like me. I will take you to museums, and parks, and monuments, and kiss you in every beautiful place, so that you can never go back to them without tasting me like blood in your mouth. I will destroy you in the most beautiful way possible. And when I leave, you will finally understand why storms are named after people.” ―Caitlyn Siehl, Literary Sexts: A Collection of Short & Sexy Love Poems

As I was reading this opening verse on “Art Parasites,” I was again reminded how much I want to allocate my “people time” to be with individuals that I care for so much that I feel pangs of hurt to be away from them. Friends that I ache to be apart from. Clients that I care about so much that I wonder how their business and personal lives are faring.

As part of my planning schedule, I’m trying to incorporate an “energy review” where I think about the kinds of people and events that either add to my reserves or draw them down. If people I’m spending my time and energy on are consuming my resources, I need to be assessing my return on investment from being with them.

Have you ever been around someone who had the ability to just light up a room – by leaving it? Or the flip-side — the people who make everything seem bright and possible when they’re around?

I wrote out my core business values several years ago after an experience of working with a client who was a drain on my immediate energy resources and my reserves. Up to that point, I hadn’t realized that my values were based on emotional energy. Energy generated by positive, collaborative relationships. Energy I needed to re-invest into doing great work.

I’ve had a habit for most of my life of using my energy the way most people use fossil fuels — with the thought that, even though the price may fluctuate for various reasons, there must be an unlimited quantity because it’s always there when I want it. 

But no energy source is either infinite or without infrastructure costs.

Over time, I’ve realized that particular people have a particularly high cost of infrastructure maintenance. And upon reflection, because I wasn’t cognizant of how I burned my own emotional fuel, I’ve been higher maintenance for people around me than I ever should have asked them to tolerate.

As an introvert, I understand that “people time” taxes my energy reserves. Therefore, it’s critical for me to invest my time into being with people that I long to be with, that challenge me to grow into my best possible self. These are people that encourage me to jettison those parts of myself that are impeding my potential. People who will destroy me in the most beautiful way possible.  

But to ask someone to be that source of encouragement for me, I have to develop the character traits that allow me to provide the same support to them.

Developing awareness may help you become cognizant of the times when you are a possible drain on others, but most importantly, it may be the first step towards making the changes needed to conserve energy for what matters most, your work. 

Charles

Weight of the World

Although the weight of anxiety hung from his shoulders like a logging chain, he still paced from one elevator opening to the next as if the angst alone would cause one of the doors to open. We were on the third floor of the hospital, the Surgical Intensive Care Unit.

As the door finally parted and we entered together, I asked, “You have family here?”

The weight of anxiety can hang off you like a logging chain. 

With a nod, “My wife.”

“What is it?”

“Colitis. Third surgery. Not looking real good. Might have to take a lot of her intestine this time.”

“Kids?”

“One boy. Fourteen. Been real hard on him.”

“Hmmm…”

“Not sure what I’m going to do. I love my wife more than myself, I tell ya. Don’t know what I’m gonna do if I lose her. I don’t think I can go on.

By this time we were in the parking lot, heading to our cars to take care of things at home.

“Anything I can do?”

No, man. I don’t know, pray? Hey, just letting me talk helps. I keep all this bottled up and I don’t know what to do. Talkin’ ‘bout it helps. Thanks, man.”

We waved as he pulled out ahead of me into the traffic. Everyone seems to be carrying their own chain. Pulling some pain in their own world of hurt. 

Charles

Three Words. One Year. New Communities.

 

Have you ever started something and then had difficulty sticking with it for the long haul? 

Several years ago, after reading a blog post by Chris Brogan, I decided to give his “three words” exercise a shot. You can see one here and another here.

Illustration of my three words by Mike Davenport.

As with so many attempts at trying new behaviors, I failed to not only stay focused on my guiding words, I couldn’t even remember what they were just a few weeks after completing my deep deliberation and engraving them into my calendar. Undaunted, I made the attempt again the next year, with similar results.

I believe the primary reason I didn’t stick with my resolve was my lack of support and accountability. I either tried to go it alone, as I often do, or else I asked for accountability from people who didn’t share my aspirations or zeal.

Getting encouragement is simply different when you’re receiving it from someone who has some “skin” in the game. Too often, I hear people talk about their dreams/goals/vision for their better selves. But they do little to put opportunities in place to actually accomplish them. Asking someone who’s already given up on their own weight-loss regimen to then encourage you to stick with yours ain’t likely to lead to a successful result.

This time around, I decided to seek my encouragement from an online community of people that Chris established who were walking the same trail. Although our goals and passions are varied, the purpose of each is to reach their individual destination.

For me, the purpose of the Brave group was to get some initial encouragement from Chris and others in the form of seeing their struggles and how they’re doing battle with their particular obstacles. But the ongoing process of encouraging others and seeing them move into and through their roadblocks helps me as I clear my own.

Throughout this year, I’ve extended my participation into several additional online communities, each with its own set of interests and pursuits. What I already knew in concept – but have watched play out repeatedly this year – is that web-based interactions call for many of the same commitments that face-to-face relationships require.

If you want a community to both grow and create a place within it to grow yourself, you must make a commitment to participate. Most people who participate do so because they want feedback and encouragement, but when they get busy, they often neglect giving those things back to others. It’s something I have been guilty of far more times than I want to admit, even to myself.

But having the community, as imperfect as it may be, to act as a cheering squad in the early stages of a new effort, and then give “shout outs” as you make progress, is priceless. I appreciate when someone has a hope that a plan will pan out. But having a structure and relationships that support it can have a far greater impact on it coming to fruition.

For too long, I have looked to build community with people based on proximity. I fought the concept of building a web of connection on the web. Although I’d prefer to have some opportunity for face-time with the web-based relationships, I trust that in time some of that will occur as well. In the meantime, the virtual relationships I’ve developed are feeding my resolve and giving me some of the support I was lacking in my previous, more solitary attempts at following through on my three words.

As for the three words I used to stimulate my growth for 2013, they were, focus, ask, and process. More to come on each in the following posts. 

How ‘bout you? What do you need to further your vision? Is there any way that I could encourage your journey?

Charles

 

 

The Power of Stuff

Over the last few years, Linda and I have been spending way more time than I could’ve imagined going through the remaining possessions of relatives who have downsized their living space or have died (the ultimate downsizing…). What I’ve seen time and again is that accumulated belongings possess an inordinate power over their owners to the point where it’s more important to them to sit amidst their stuff than be with the people they say they value more.

My Aunt Frances’ possessions stored in a unit to be sorted in eight months.

So much time and energy was spent boxing, storing, and otherwise keeping things which would eventually be sorted and trashed by us or others instead of doing something more meaningful that would leave themselves or others better off.

My Aunt Frances slipped into my grandparents’ house after my Papoo died and took a bunch of furniture and other things before her sisters arrived. She locked the stuff she’d taken into a storage building behind her house which eventually leaked and ruined almost everything she had poached. What she left behind has either been thrown away or is now being held in a storage facility at an expense of several hundred dollars to her estate to wait for her remaining relatives to sort through.

To what end?

One effect it’s had on us is to examine the accumulation of our own stuff. We’re in the process of cleaning out our own storage spaces. We’re donating or discarding stuff we don’t use. We’re examining the way we spend our time more closely.

I have been greatly moved by a quote from Annie Dillard, “The way we spend our days is the way we spend our lives.” I’ve been reading and meditating on that thought for several weeks.

Our days seem to pass in a flash with little to show for many of them. But added together they become the legacy we leave. I don’t want the sum of my life to be closets and storage units full of meaningless stuff somebody has to sort through. What’s the point?

I want my legacy to be something I wrote or said that made someone else’s load a little lighter or at least more bearable to bear. I want you and others to know that you’re valued. What we all need are more experiences that shape us into our better selves. Not to become vessels of stuff that other people waste time discarding.

How about you? What are your thoughts?

Charles

From Fear to Anger to Awareness

I have three angry, negative relationships that are impacting my life, but I don’t know how to extricate myself from any of them. Maybe you have some of those as well.

I find my irritation rises not only when I have to use valuable creative energy to deal with the mess these soul-sucking crazy-makers create, but also when I read or hear trite advice to simply cut the negative people out of one’s life. It’s as simple as deciding to wish away the cancer that has consumed a victim’s body.

What I’m trying to do instead is learn and grow from the experience of dealing with these difficult individuals. By sharing my observations, I hope to more deeply understand what I perceive.

What I consistently notice about anger is that it stems from deep, unresolved fear. What each of these people has is a fear that is so deeply entrenched that there is almost no way to get to the cause and expose it for scrutiny and resolution. The emotion of anger has become so raw and close to the surface that there is no regard for who gets damaged by it.

What scares me most is how easily I can be infected by their hatred. I’d like to believe I’m so strong that I can’t be touched by their negative energy. But that’s like pretending I’m invincible to radiation while standing in the core of a nuclear reactor. The first contact with any of them produces a reactionary, lizard-brain flash of anger in return.

It scares me because my reaction means I must also be holding on to a fear so deep that I can’t name it or detect it. At least not quickly enough to stop my own negative flush of adrenaline. It would be so easy to point the finger at others in regards to their evil without recognizing how close to them I really am in my emotional response.

I don’t now how much I would pay to disentangle myself from these sorts of people. But even if they were gone, without dealing with my own deep fears, I’m still going to be stuck with myself.

How about you? Do you have any angry people or negative situations where an aphorism or positive mantra won’t turn your mind around? How do you respond? How is it transforming you?

Let me know. I still have a lot to learn.

Charles