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Towards the end of May, the Washington Nationals baseball team had virtually no chance of making the playoffs. They were done. Time to fire the manager and start over.
In 2015, there was "no chance" that some outlier reality TV character would have a shot at the Presidency. Similarly, in 2007, pundits assured their audiences that America wouldn't elect a junior Senator from Chicago.
Just yesterday I was listening to story of a Marine hit with an IED, who spent 18 months in the hospital being told he'd never walk again. He just ran a marathon.
Sometimes, experts are wrong. But that doesn't mean we abandon expertise. It does mean we have an opportunity to push our experts to adopt a new phrase: "I was wrong."
It takes a tremendous amount of humility and we're not wired to admit our shortcomings. It looks like weakness. It feels like defeat. When I was a classroom teacher, nothing (and I mean nothing) was worse than a student correcting me. I'm the teacher. I'm supposed to be all-knowing, infallible. But what I learned about my "inability" to be wrong is that it didn't mean I was a strong teacher or that I was in control of my classroom: it meant I didn't respect my students.
I need more practice admitting I'm wrong. I think we all do. We're each and collectively wrong all the time, but how often do we cover-up, hide, deflect, or redirect our mistakes so as not to feel the hot surge of shame washing over us?
Try this: next time you're wrong about something, stop everything, take one deep breath, and say, "you know what, I'm wrong. I'm sorry." Don't add any explanation. Don't try to justify. Don't try to spin the story. Just acknowledge that mistakes are a necessary part of learning and you are willing to learn. And then try to see how you can acknowledge and respect the other person's humanity by your being wrong.
As we head towards a season of gratitude, maybe even try to breathe a silent thank you for the other person's patience in helping you to grow. I think you'll find that each time you do, the trust and respect will grow between you and the other person.
But maybe I'm wrong...
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What I'm Reading
Martin Sheen (narrator)
Almost all of my cover-to-cover reading happens in audio format. (My academic reading, which is rarely a whole book and typically only select chapters of a published paper, is always text-on-the-screen.) This month, however, it's not a book so much as a podcast. (I just heard half of you rejoicing...)
Martin Sheen (!!!) narrates this incredible compilation of stories (including live audio of folks from the era) about life in the US during WWII. I can't possibly begin to unpack how rich this was and I'm comfortable admitting I very nearly skipped this selection, thinking it would be a cursory overview of the WWII highlights we're all familiar with. I am SO GLAD I was wrong on both fronts and this is absolutely worth your $7. (Bonus, because it's basically a podcast that's been strung together into a single file, it's a lot easier to start/stop between episodes.)
Here's a behind-the-scenes teaser that, hopefully, convinces you to spend some time hearing from those who lived through WWII what it was like.
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Around the Web
Claire Lew
Number 5 in this list especially hit home for me (you ask, "how can I help you?") because it's meant with sincerity, but it never occurred to me how I might be dodging my share of the lift.
If you're responsible for the development of others, this is a good read that will (hopefully/probably) challenge some of your tacit beliefs. If you have a supervisor (ha!) then this could be a good starting point to talk through how to make your relationship even more productive.
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Just for fun:
ICYMI: Harvard has an implicit bias test that purports to measure your unconscious bias among several different groups of people. We were talking a lot about this on our team at work and given this month's theme, it seems rather apropos.
One note for those with the same skeptical gene as me: if you take it once and 'don't get it' or are wondering how it works, take a second test. If you're like me, the second test will be a completely different experience for you and you'll gain more insight into what's happening between your ears without any conscious input from you.
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