We Are Not Pizza

…we can’t make everyone happy. To start, happiness is an inside job. It comes from within. When we give other people the power to steal our peace or happiness, that’s on us. Not other people. That’s a harsh reality but an important one to understand. I’m not speaking about extreme realities such as dangerous or abusive situations. I’m speaking about the every day, day-to-day battle of trying to be a functional human being in a challenging world and complex working environment.

Certainly, the words, decisions, actions, and attitudes of others can make living in our peace and contentment challenging. However, our response is up to us. That’s all we’ve got at the end of the day. We choose how we speak to ourselves and how we respond to others. It’s the one thing we’ve got that others can’t take from us.

As I sit here drinking my coffee with a cat in my lap on this rainy Sunday, I find myself reliving hard moments from the previous week and wondering what new misery awaits me this week. Not an approach to the weekend that I would recommend for others. The good news is that I can recognize it when it is happening, and I can work on reframing thoughts, so they better serve me. When all else fails, I can simply say in my head, “I’m not going to worry about that right now.” For those of us with Olympic metals in worry and anxiety, telling ourselves not to worry rarely works, but giving ourselves space to postpone worry is a fun little trick, ha.

Navigating change is difficult and leading change can feel almost impossible. Did we get into education to keep things exactly as they are, or did we get into education to build a better tomorrow? Not everything in education needs an overhaul. When it comes time, however, to try to make progress in areas where change is needed, we have to be very thoughtful with our process. We need to ensure we’ve included and considered many diverse perspectives, that we’ve done our research, that a communication plan is in place, and we need to ensure they we are not outpacing our communities readiness for change.

When all of that is solid, then we need to understand that even when we feel confident in our direction, people will still criticize us. They will still criticize the work. Again, we are not pizza. If you’re intrigued by this pizza thing, I wrote an entire chapter on it in Legacy of Learning.

When people are being critical, it’s important to be able to acknowledge when there is validity to their criticism. When a change is well thought out, we already knows what critiques exist, equipped with this knowledge, we can mitigate vulnerabilities to the extent possible.

As Brene Brown says, “Don’t think you get to be brave with your work and not be criticized.”

So, what do we do then? How do we lead changes, big or small, and still live in our peace or happiness?

We embrace what Brown describes in Strong Ground as the leadership paradox. Essentially, we can hold two truths at the same time. We can believe something is right and still acknowledge it’s hard. We can believe that we meant well and still acknowledge when something didn’t land well. We can believe in what we are doing and acknowledge there is room for improvement.

Both can be true. Our ability to hold two opposing truths at the same time will make or break our ability to lead people and organizations into a brighter and better future.

You can make mistakes and have a hard week AND be a competent professional and leader.

Both can be true.

We are not pizza. But maybe we need to take a deep breath, enjoy a slice, and recognize that we are not responsible for what happens to us or the actions of others. We are responsible for our integrity, our communication, our work, our presence, and our response.

We can have room to grow AND be doing a good job. The same is true for those around us.

Embrace the paradox this week.