AWARENESS 101
Image Credit: African American Registry
I am convinced that most people do not grow up. We find parking spaces and honor our credit cards. We marry and dare to have children and call that growing up. I think what we do is mostly grow old. We carry accumulation of years in our bodies and on our faces, but generally our real selves, the children inside, are still innocent and shy as magnolias.
Maya Angelou (1928—2014) was an American poet, memoirist, and civil rights activist. As a singer, dancer, activist, poet, and writer, she inspired generations with lyrical modern African-American thought that pushed boundaries. Best known for her autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (Random House), she gave people the freedom to think about their history in a way they never had before.
Angelou was a keen observer of the world around her. The themes from her seven autobiographies include racism, identity, family, and travel. A common thread across all of her work focused on the injustice of racism and how to fight it. Her work documents the ups and downs of her own personal and professional life.
The theme of family and family relationships is important in all of her books. As the slave narrative anchors some of her work, travel is another important theme in Angelou's autobiographies. Scholar Yolanda M. Manora called the travel motif in Angelou's autobiographies, beginning in Caged Bird, "a central metaphor for a psychic mobility". Angelou's autobiographies "stretch time and place", from Arkansas to Africa and back to the US, and span almost forty years, beginning from the start of World War II to the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.
Chappel makes an interesting interviewer. They interview one another on the craft of writing and the cathartic process of finding their voice.
AWARENESS 101
Always be observing. Maintain an open mind. Be eager to improve. Increase awareness, increase choices, and ability to connect with others.
We can become more aware by observing what is going on inside and around us. Except for personal experience, we learn everything we know from someone else. We learn by watching others, reading, or listening. We can learn something from everyone, even if it is what not to do, by synthesizing the behaviors as others into information for constant learning.
When we are unaware we miss opportunities to improve ourselves. This positions us to inadvertently repeat errors—our own, and those we learn from others. We need to keep a lookout for circumstances or situations that can help or harm us and be eager to learn from our experiences.
We each can learn and achieve. Being alert makes the task of reaching our potential that much easier.
We may be more curious in areas that interest us, and therefore more alert to particular signals. If we want to understand what makes people work more effectively together, we need to get curious about leadership as a discipline. We need to see leading as an expression of who we are as a person and not just a title.
When we are under pressure, we adopt tunnel vision. Our awareness narrows to a single experience. Perhaps it’s a goal. If we are under threat, it might just be to protect ourselves. Focus is essential to progress, but a broader view helps us see alternative strategies we might not have considered.
An inquisitive person is more apt to discover the truth than someone with a closed mind. That’s why awareness is an essential skill.
How do we learn to remain inquisitive and observant amidst distraction, threat, or lack of direction?
PRACTICE:
Our first thoughts are never our fault. It’s what we decide to do next that matters.
How does awareness change us?
When we learn to see, taste, hear, and feel; when we learn to discern and discriminate through participation and observation; when we learn to make distinctions and become an expert; and, when we grow intimate with the details of a particular medium from our activity with and in it. Awareness, the kind that changes our decision making, takes practice, practice, practice.
We have three levels of awareness:
Initial awareness is gained through reflection after an incident occurs. If we understand what the gap in our behavior is and know what it should be, we have a shot at catching ourselves in the act the next time. Think of an incident you wish had gone differently.
When we successfully catch ourselves in the moment, we get just enough time to make a different choice. Consider what you might have done and think of 5 alternative responses.
When we catch ourselves enough times, we can spot a trigger coming rather than having it blindside us into rash reactivity. Seeing a trigger coming gives us even more time to choose a different reaction. Think about how interactions with this person might go in the future, and review your five alternatives. Choose a different response.
NOTE: You are in and out of these three phases ALL THE TIME based on how triggered you are at any time and how aware you are of your triggers when you are triggered.
COMMIT
[ ] I commit myself to choose response over reactivity in situations where I’m under pressure or triggered.
FURTHER READING/ WATCHING
American Masters: Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise (PBS Documentary): Distinctly referred to as “a redwood tree, with deep roots in American culture,” icon Maya Angelou gave people the freedom to think about their history in a way they never had before. Dr. Angelou’s was a prolific life; as a singer, dancer, activist, poet, and writer she inspired generations with lyrical modern African-American thought that pushed boundaries. This unprecedented film celebrates Dr. Maya Angelou by weaving her words with rare and intimate archival photographs and videos, which paint hidden moments of her exuberant life during some of America’s most defining moments. From her upbringing in the Depression-era South to her work with Malcolm X in Ghana to her inaugural speech for President Bill Clinton, the film takes us on an incredible journey through the life of a true American icon.
The Collected Autobiographies of Maya Angelou: This work traces the best and worst of the American experience in an achingly personal way. Angelou has chronicled her remarkable journey and inspired people of every generation and nationality to embrace life with commitment and passion.
American Masters: Maya Angelou: Distinctly referred to as “a redwood tree, with deep roots in American culture,” Dr. Maya Angelou led a prolific life. Explore it here through this timeline of her books, and learn a little bit more about the woman who inspires so many.
In Her Words…
“Each time a woman stands up for herself, without knowing it possibly, without claiming it, she stands up for all women.”
“People live in direct relationship to the heros and sheros they have.”
“That’s the wonderful thing about the ‘icon.’ You continue to grow, and you develop courage—the most important of all the virtues. Without courage, you can’t practice any other virtue consistently. If you’ve seen another truth, you have the courage to change your thinking.”
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
“You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.”
“We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.”
“You can only become truly accomplished at something you love.”
“If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.”
“I would like to be known as an intelligent woman, a courageous woman, a loving woman, a woman who teaches by being.”
“Seek patience and passion in equal amounts. Patience alone will not build the temple. Passion alone will destroy its walls.”
“My great hope is to laugh as much as I cry; to get my work done, to try and love somebody and have the courage to accept the love in return.”
“You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.”
“Have enough courage to trust love one more time and always one more time.”
“Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.”
“We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.”
“The desire to reach the stars is ambitious. The desire to reach hearts is wise and most possible.”
“As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands, one for helping yourself, the other for helping others.”
“In all my work, in the movies I write, the lyrics, the poetry, the prose, the essays, I am saying that we may encounter many defeats – maybe it’s imperative that we encounter the defeats – but we are much stronger that we appear to be and maybe much better than we allow ourselves to be.”
“It’s one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself, to forgive. Forgive everybody.”
“Prejudice is a burden that confuses the past, threatens the future and renders the present inaccessible.”
“Nothing will work unless you do.”
“Continue to be who and how you are, to astonish a mean world with acts of kindness. Continue to allow humor to lighten the burden of your tender heart.”
“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”
“I’m grateful to be a woman. I must have done something great in another life.”
What we don’t see on the resumes we review or the job descriptions we want is the litany of emotional entanglements we bring to our roles, uninvited, to the team and organizations we work in. Alongside technical skills, people who can master a range of subjective skills are better able to influence, deal with ambiguity, bounce back from setbacks, think creatively, and manage themselves in the presence of setbacks. In short, those who learn lead.
Observing subjective qualities in others past and present gives us a mental picture for the behaviors we want to practice. Each figure illustrates a quality researched from The Look to Craftsmen Project. When practiced as part of our day-to-day, these qualities will help us develop our mastery in our lives and work.
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