Digging deeper with August's Connection theme

Hello Friends,

I hope that you're well and safe wherever you are. August is bringing in its shorter days and colder nights as we enjoy the last days of summer and start preparing for the autumn. 🍃🍂

What will the next months bring? How will we be able to nurture our relationships and sense of connection that we feel to others if we're forced back into our homes with new physical distancing orders? What is it going to mean for artists... some of us are already feeling unanchored after a season without touring and so much uncertainty ahead? These questions can feel overwhelming!
While some respond with spiking anxiety, others are retreating, as if weighed down in a sense of depression. It's perfectly understandable.

The key to cutting through this fog is "CONNECTION" - what brings us together and what binds us.🤝

In the next few days, I'll go back to a business theme and discuss professional networking, but today, I'd like to share an exercise with you that changed my life by reconnecting me to the people around me. Since then, it's an exercise I use in coaching. It's writing your Obituary!

That may sound morbid, but it's not... bear with me as I explain the backstory and then describe the exercise. 🤔


 

HOW READING OBITUARIES SAVED MY LIFE

For years, I'd been living out of a suitcase, traveling from country to country, with short stops home to wash clothes and hug the kids... Coming home was always a bit of letdown. Travel was exciting - engaging with people in training, exploring new places, learning new ways of looking at the world... Being home meant starting every day with a coffee and the Winnipeg Free Press.

I'd read the obituaries... In Winnipeg, an obituary is a short story, a glimpse of the courage and character of each hero's journey. I loved reading about immigrants escaping from oppression, grand love stories across the prairies, expressions of faith and the joy of family. These words were inspiring, and I'd occasionally cut out a line I found particularly touching.

One day I was suddenly struck at how the vocabulary changed from one type of obituary to another. There were the tributes to "successful people" whose path was remembered with "respect". They were often "sorely missed". And then there were the "everyday folk" who were being "lovingly remembered" and whose families were "heartbroken", "forever grateful", "truly blessed". I noticed patterns so that for the first, their story was one of professional achievement and for the second, their story was one of everyday actions of service and of strong connection.

I wondered what my own kids would say were I to pass away... I had to admit that while they might be able to list some impressive credentials, they might be hard-pressed to capture the love I had for them in the description of a moment shared together. I actually felt quite sick to realize how much I'd placed the importance of my work over the value of baking cookies, playing cards or going to basketball games together. As I sketched out the obituary I imagined them writing and a second obituary of what I would want to be said, I knew that I needed my life to change.

A couple of days later, I was in a van with my two daughters and their friend, driving 3500 km to California! The girls had approached me with this idea that if they skipped three days of school and combined March Break and Easter Break, we could take off for ten days and drive out of the winter to the sun. I'll never forget the look on their faces when I answered "Okay"... it was absolute madness and I did have a few WTF moments on the drive there, but that trip marked the beginning of my commitment to building stronger connections with them and in the process, adopting a more light-hearted approach to life. That was in March 2012. We still talk about that trip and giggle...

Embracing a simpler life of connection was a process that took months and even years. I had to let go of what I believed "success" to be and find a definition that fit with my own priorities. I think we're raised with so much pressure to be famous, to build empires and to be wealthy that we carry a sense of inadequacy or latent disappointment when we aren't at the top. It all seems a bit 1980s now, but the culture of conspicuous money and fame are still prevalent in the media. And maybe even more so for artists who are reminded daily that they need to produce "hits" and win awards to be "successful"...

And yet, obituaries tell us a very different of what being successful is! An obituary is the recounting of a life. It is the lasting memory of what a person has been and left with the world. As you read obituaries, you realize that "success" really boils down to the connections we create and nurture: the people we touched, the growth we empowered, the happiness we encouraged... measured in home-baked cookies, 5am drives to the hockey rink, kind words, moments shared.

There is dignity and grace in those simple moments of connection. Ironically, the most ephemeral of these can create a long-lasting memory and as such, our legacy.



 

(Live! A collage created from a thousand moments of living.)




 

WRITE YOUR OWN OBITUARY

So, how do you write an obituary? It's easier than you think, but be prepared for an emotional tug or two. Find a quiet space and mark out some undisturbed time for this exercise.

You'll write it in the third person. Imagine it to be a document read in the future, by a great-grandchild for example. You write your name and date of birth. For the sake of the exercise, imagine you living to 100 years old!

The opening paragraph is not only the announcement of a passing but of its effect on those left behind. "We are heartbroken to announce", "With heavy hearts..." ...

I see the body of an obituary as a hologram with a life journey in multiple dimensions: the factual relating of key moments, a subjective layer that describes the spirit of a person, the connection layer that describes the impact of certain decisions and actions on others and finally, at times, a contextual layer that describes a setting. The body as a whole tells the story of our path, how we embraced it, who we met and what we left behind.

A great obituary creates a sense of connection with the person reading it years later. In the specific details of knitting mittens and Thanksgiving dinners, a reader can find a universal story of longing, laughter and love.

The last part of the obituary deals with the logistics (burial, ceremony, etc.) and can be skipped for the sake of this exercise. (That said, there is often a part that is telling: a cause people are asked to donate to in memory of. When you think about a cause and narrow down the one you would want associated with the story of your life, it actually tells a lot about what you deeply care about.)

You can either start writing straight out or begin with some brainstorming to map out the different pieces that make up the puzzle of your life before deciding which ones you want to include.
You can put in any element of any bucket list you have! This is a creative exercise for yourself - so approach it in whatever way feels most comfortable and meaningful.

Once you've finished as much as you feel you want to, read it through.
What are the things that stand out?
Who are the people you care for and connect with?
How are your best days being spent?

And then, compare those answers with your current plans. And if you feel you need to make changes, start. Start with the little changes. It can be as easy as sending out a few messages of care or of taking 15 seconds to comment on a loved one's post. Cut down the ruts, transform routine into ritual where you can. You'll have a good sense of what you want to do - you just need to listen to your heart and gut and trust they'll lead you forward. 💖


 

ARE YOU STILL WITH ME?! 😳

This was a pretty intense blog post! Are you still with me?!

I remember my sister walking in to my collage work and many cuttings spread on the table, a worried look on her face as she told me she was concerned at how weird it all was.

"I know it's not really normal, but take a look at this story...". I showed her the clippings from two obituaries - a couple who had been married over 70 years and died a few days apart. Their stories brought tears to her eyes. The love that transpired in the telling of them touched us. Made us want to be kinder to those in our lives. She understood then why I was so drawn to the stories of others in the search to create my own, why in valuing their connections, I felt better equipped to create my own.

I didn't stop traveling until Covid 19 grounded me long enough to put the suitcase away. But the nature of my traveling changed as did my time at home. I now know that connection is created through care and time. It can happen in a kitchen or, as we have discovered, over a screen.

I'll leave you with a couple of images of what happened after I wrote that first obituary and hope that it shows you how uplifting this exercise actually be!

Until then, be well! 🌅

xo Nat

(After four days on the road... from grey skies & snow to sun & sand & smiles)