Viewing entries tagged
compassion

Haben Girma

This week, Rach was speaking at a two-day online conference run by the incredible Mary Freer, called Compassion Revolution. Seth Godin was speaking too, but the really intriguing human that was sharing the stage with Rach was a woman named Haben Girma.

Haben is a deafblind woman of colour, the first deafblind person in history to graduate from Harvard Law School. She chats with presidents, advocates for greater human and disability rights, and is beautiful and funny and gracious. She delivered a keynote over zoom that got us all thinking deeply about our biases and identities and potential.

Incidentally, for those who, like Haben, are reading this post (yep, it’s possible) I am a tallish white male in my forties, currently folded into the back corner of a coffeeshop with a notebook and a laptop. I’m wearing a dark blue t-shirt that is splashed with white flowers that have pink edges. There are so many humans around me, but I can’t hear them, because I have headphones on, listening to “Games” by Bakermat. The music is joyful and melancholic, and feels like someone is shaking both your hands, but in time to your heartbeat, so that your whole body bounces in rhythm to your pulse.

Anyway, the morning after the conference, Rach and I are sitting in bed drinking coffee and she says simply, “my Instagram is ableist.”

I ask her what that even means, and she explains that without choosing to, without even thinking about it, she has built a collection of imagery and art that only those with sight can enjoy. There are videos whose auto-captions would barely make sense to someone without hearing who rely completely on captions.

“That’s hardly ableist, though.” I say, trying to defend her honour or something, “It’s not like you’re deliberately marginalising anyone.”

She stares into her cup, the steam backlit by the early sunlight. “But that’s the thing. It’s not deliberate, but it is ignorant. I’m being lazy, Nath, because I’m comfortable doing things the way I’ve always done them.”

“So it’s ignorant ableism, then?”

“Yeah, I think it is. By not even thinking about inclusion, we are by default EX-cluding people."

This is how we talk sometimes. Big concepts (at least big to me), just casually introduced at 5am before the caffeine has even kicked in. I try to keep up. “How can your Instagram be more inclusive then?”

And she comes alive. Descriptions for each of her artworks, captions that are accurate, commentary on the visuals of our white papers, multi-sensory experiences. And then I get excited too, and together we come up with all these ideas around experiential art exhibitions, better websites and identity descriptors, and other stuff that just feels powerful to talk about.

We talk about community, how it has always shined the brightest through service. Helping, lifting, sharing, encouraging, contributing, they’re all elemental traits that build humanity. Though all of us prefer comfort, as soon as we react to someone else’s need, we feel a sense of forward motion for humanity. Like we actually contributed to a meaningful story.

I know right now this is talk not action, but the talking helps remove the ignorance. It shines a torchlight in a corner that I forget to look at. Ignorant ableism is absolutely a thing I do. Along with ignorant racism, climatism, sexism, and every other big conversation. I just don’t know what I don’t know, and that’s a whole lot.

And, I don’t know what to do, all the time. What the right things are, the best way to act, etc. But I do know that I’m built for this: for learning, growing, serving, assisting. We’re all built for it. My challenge is to stay aware, and to not be fearful of the discomfort as I learn and grow. Because finding ways to lift each other up and value everyone equally is soul-edifying, it is life-giving, and it is absolutely human.

Learn more about Haben, and buy her memoir, at www.habengirma.com

More about Compassion Revolution: www.compassionrevolution.care

The gold we don't know we have

Some beautiful friends will meet us at a cafe in an hour. It's been a while since we've caught up, and they have stories to share: stories of losing a baby, of living through cancer, of managing rambunctious kids, of working in their own businesses, of just trying to survive.

I wonder how their faith is now. And their relationship? Do they still have that spark, that driving love for each other that was so evident the moment they met? How hard is life for them, and how can Rach and I best give love? Be love?

What is it, to be a friend?

Perhaps, it is to sit with when times are hard. To encourage when feeling down. To listen more than speak. To intuit, towards wisdom. To be love, in as many different forms as possible.

Also, perhaps, it is to create experiences that last. Tell a story that is funny. Remind them that they are loveable. Place them in a scene where they are the hero. Encourage the parts of them that they can’t draw out on their own today.

I don't have the answers. This isn't that kind of post. And I'm honestly not very good at maintaining a lot of friends. But I'm tremendously interested, as an observer and a participant in this magic that happens between friends. There seems to be a third entity that is created when two people converse: something neither of us could create on our own. In community, we seem to draw out parts of each other that are hidden.

We mine the gold we don't even know the other has, and the tools of discovery are love, encouragement and compassion.

I would like today's conversation to be something like that. Just find the gold, allow it to be its own expansive entity, and when we say our goodbyes, we all somehow walk away with the treasure.

On the road: Abbortsford Convent, Melbourne AU

(March 2018)

We landed at 5am this morning in Melbourne.
Rach is an amazing sleeper. She sat right next to me, eyes closed and face down, completely zenned out. Like a monk in prayer.

I’m not so successful at the sleeping thing.
I spent the flight staring at the back of my eyelids, and exploring every other sensation my body had running. I imagined being blind, and how all my other senses would grow stronger, like a superhero.

I could hear the low rumble of the engines, and a few muffled conversations two rows forward. I heard every snap and click of the bathroom doors. I heard so many coughs I lost count. I wondered if I could influence dreams, up there in the sky with all these sleeping souls. So I pushed thoughts of courageous generosity out into the ether, but, no one woke and gave me 20 dollers, so I guess it didn’t work.

One of the things I love about Rachel Callander is how she does this: The travelling, speaking, training, listening thing. She hustles so strong, but at the same time she’s not grasping at all, not chasing the spotlight, even when the spotlight chases her. The learning, the studying and thinking is hardcore, but the delivery is kind of effortless.

Not EASY effortless, but, more like, joyfully determined.
Like, she’s been told her future, been given that certainty, so now, no matter what the journey looks like, or how hard it gets, she’ll lean in to it with a cavalier open heartedness.

Psychologist Angela Duckworth would call this “grit”, I think.

—-

Abbortsford Convent is a peaceful ancient thing, straight out of a Harry Potter novel. I swear I saw some kids just finishing up a game of quidditch in the courtyard when we arrived. I laid some books on a table in the hall and enquired about coffee, and Rach stepped up to the stage.

This is the third year North Richmond Community Health has run their “Conversations About Care” symposium, and it has become something quite beautiful and powerful. It feels like a summit of elders, a gathering of altruism where the conversation isn’t about personal gain, money, justice or excuses, but instead, we hear ideas about transforming the customer experience, flattening the hierarchy of ego, building equal respect for both the patient and the professional.

Rach is alive here - Softly buzzing with questions, empathy, warmth and strength. She’s taking notes and sketching models into her Moleskine, and remembering every name she comes across.

I’m terrible with names, and have to write everything down:
Susan Alberti AC - A powerhouse of forward motion;
John McKenna - The Yoda of the Health System, reminding us of our limitless potential in life;
Dr Ajesh George, Prof. John Aitken, Dr Jonathan Silverman, Lucy Mayes, Dr Ioan Jones, Dr Katy Theodore, Dr Martin Hall.
Incredible humans, investing their lives into healthcare and relationships.

Rach whispers to me in passing, “These are our people, Nath!”

And I close my eyes, and again push my thoughts out into the ether; and I see a room full of people invested in humanity and cultural change.

Looks like I found that courageous generosity after all.