Learning From Our Worst Moments
February 27th would have been my nephew Chris Hallee’s 40th birthday. Instead of preparing to celebrate this gregarious and lovable young man (pictured here with me in 2002), I am writing this post about missing him. Chris was like a son to me. He came to live with me when he was 19 and in the initial stages of what was to become a lifetime battle with drugs. Despite my best efforts and those of his parents, friends, and many others, Chris died of an opioid overdose in November of 2018. With a heart full of love, I write now about what I learned from this experience - the lowest moment of my life.
I started out writing a simple blog post about converting failures into gifts and opportunities. In my coaching practice, I have learned that often failure is just a construct of the mind. We often set our own goals and, when we miss them, we let our inner critics go wild beating ourselves (and others) up for not measuring up to our ideals. I have learned to challenge myself, and my clients, to consider how we can convert failures into gifts or opportunities by seeking to learn and grow from the experience. And often we can, especially when the stakes are low. But when something truly awful happens and the “failure,” cuts deeply into the very core of who we are as human beings, it is incredibly difficult to see the “gift” in it. Paradoxically, when the stakes are that high, it is even more important to try. That’s why I decided to write about what I consider to be my biggest failure - my failure to save my nephew.
I know it wasn’t my responsibility to save him, but that doesn’t really help. When it comes to factors that contributed to his death, there is more than enough blame to go around: our legal system that chose to put Chris in jail rather than treat his addiction; the criminal record that kept from finding a good job; the lack of available, affordable, rehab for those who need it; the lack of sober housing and support for those coming out of rehab; the stigma attached to addiction that made it so hard to ask for help. And finally the fentanyl that killed him. To name just a few.
Knowing there were myriad reasons why this happened didn’t stop me from looking within to see how I might have contributed to his death. I beat myself up over what I did and failed to do. My list of sins and omissions was endless.
Finally, about a year ago, I began to see how Chris’s death had changed me. How it prompted me to reconsider how I was living my life. The deeper I delved into my soul to find something of value in this sea of pain, the more meaningfully I connected with everyone in my life. I let my guard down. I asked for help. I reached out to others, heart to heart. I told Chris’s story to help generate support for those struggling with addiction, to help change the system that failed him. As I learned to cope with my bottomless sadness, I felt a new calling rising within me. I wanted to help others with their struggles. I decided to embark on the path of becoming a coach.
I thought about the pain and suffering I had imposed upon myself my whole life, seeking to reach one goal after another and beating myself up endlessly each time I fell short. What a waste it all had been! Compared with losing Chris, every one of those disappointments was a mere scratch. Those “failures” really didn't matter at all. What mattered was picking myself up, learning the lessons I needed to learn, and trying again. And, it must be said, setting better goals. More empowering goals. Goals tied to my deepest values. Goals worthy of my best efforts.
In my coaching practice, I work with clients every day who face challenges that loom large to them. They live in fear of failing. The consequences seem dire. I don’t want to minimize their anxiety, the risk of failure is very real to them. But I do have a different perspective.
Having faced one of the most horrible things that can happen in life - losing someone I loved like my own child unexpectedly and preventably - I learned that I can rise. There is a gift even in this unimaginable loss.
Thinking that we can avoid failure or loss is a lie. We cannot avoid risks. And when we live our lives in ways that don’t at least flirt with potential failure, we don’t allow ourselves to live our lives full out. We impose limits on our own capacity to challenge ourselves and grow because we are afraid that we won’t succeed. We allow ourselves to be ruled by fear.
What happens if you reorient your relationship to failure to consider it not as a negative outcome, but as a learning opportunity? What if you adopt the attitude that, no matter the outcome, you will find a way to turn it into a gift or opportunity?
That, my friends, is a game changer. If you look, you will see evidence of such transformations all around you. In fact, our American mythology of pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps is based on it. We celebrate the hero who experiences setbacks and rises to meet the challenge(s). Why then is it so hard to see how this applies to our own lives?
Consider a time in your own life when you had a setback or failed to meet a goal you set for yourself. First, I ask you to exercise your self empathy muscle. Nothing is ever, ever, I mean ever, gained from beating yourself or anyone else up. So with a sense of curiosity, not criticism, ask yourself three questions:
What can I learn from this experience so that I will have a better outcome in the future?
How can this outcome help me grow as a person by connecting me more deeply with others - my family, my team, my friends - perhaps by making me more empathetic to other people and to myself?
How can this experience inspire me to take action I would not otherwise have taken?
I won’t pretend that doing this is always easy. It can be quite confronting to look closely at our own actions to see how we could have done better. But I can say with absolute certainty that doing this with authenticity, vulnerability and without blame can help us see our way, not only to better results in the future, but more importantly, happier, and more peaceful lives.
As I look back and remember that moment all those years ago, when Chris first called me to ask if he could come and live with me, I can’t help but remember the trepidation I had in taking on the challenge of taking care of him. I knew nothing about parenting. I was single and traveled a great deal for my job. I had no business taking on a teenager with so many issues. It is easy to think I failed him, at least on some level. And, knowing how unprepared I was, maybe I shouldn’t have tried. But, if I hadn’t, look at what I would have missed! I would have missed the love, the connection, the purpose of life. I would have missed everything.
If you want to learn more about how coaching can help you reframe your relationship with setbacks or loss, please reach out to me for a free, no-obligation conversation.