How the Standards of Respect Explain How to Move Forward - Part 5: Be a Team Player

How the Standards of Respect Explain How to Move Forward??

Part 5: Be a Team Player?

This is part five of a series on how the Standards of Respect explain how to move forward. Click here for part one,?part two,?part three and part four.

“To a disciple who was forever complaining about others, the Master said, ‘If it is peace you want, seek to change yourself, not other people. It is easier to protect your feet with slippers than to carpet the whole of the earth.’” — Anthony de Mello

You’ve put in the work. Congratulations. You’ve acknowledged the situation, listened to yourself, communicated with others, and started to be responsive by making new habits. To continue the metaphor above, you’ve put your slippers on. To you, the world feels carpeted now. As one of you told me privately, you’re stronger for having gone through this experience.

You’re proud and feeling good, but you can’t shake this nagging feeling that something is missing.

Then it dawns on you: others don’t feel the carpet. People in your life might be barefoot.

Here’s the question I shared with that colleague: “If you’re stronger, what are you going to do with that strength?” It’s time to be a team player and help others.

When you read that you probably thought, “What do I have to offer other people?” Missing from the listening post was how talking to a trusted person can help someone understand what they’re going through. Now that you’ve gotten yourself unstuck and into a better place, you can help others by holding the space for them to come to their own realizations, share with you if they want to, and make a safe ask for help if there is one. They can feel seen and not alone.

“It seems obvious that asking someone how they feel helps us better understand them. Yet, how many of us choose to guess how other people feel instead of simply asking them?” – Greg McKeown

This isn’t about trying to change people, pointing out their bare feet, or preaching about something you’re doing (though sharing suggestions may be helpful). It’s about being “alive to the needs of others” as they put it in Outward Mindset. It’s about using your new stable footing to check in on others and support them. It’s because you’ve been there. You truly get it now, and as the poet and novelist George Eliot?posed, “What do we live for, if not to make life less difficult for each other?”

One great tool in our toolkit to be a team player is the Check You, Check Two model. First, check in with yourself; you need to continue applying what you’ve learned first. Make sure you stay on that stable footing. Then, check in with others. How are they doing today? What’s new in their world? How does that make them feel? What support do they need?

By reaching out to others and continuing to model your own work, you can encourage people to start their own journey to meet their future selves.

We still have one more mile marker ahead for us on our journey, be kind, where I’ll share a personal story that will challenge your definition of who your “team” is.

In the meantime, who are you going to check in with?

Matt

For Part 6, click here.