Last week, we spoke about Edwin Friedman’s Non-anxious presence. Most people miss his teaching and perceive that the non-anxious presence is about disconnecting from others and building their barriers to protect themselves from others. The real story is that Friedman encouraged a more profound connection. The connection just doesn’t need to succumb to or center on anxiety. Instead, it should center on shared goals and the good of the family system. It should be implied that families have to stay connected to function at their optimal range, but many miss that part of family systems theory.
So to answer our question of how to spend integrity, isn’t a question of how strong you are or impervious you might be, but how connected are you?
How to Spend Integrity
Have integrity
Be non-anxious
Stay connected to those around you
Catalyze the anxious around you toward a common goal
Pee Wee Reese
Do you remember the story of Pee Wee Reese and Jackie Robinson? What made the story work was not just Robinson’s undaunting courage and fortitude, but also Reese’s connection to his teammate and the crowd. Reese was popular across the country at the time. People enjoyed watching him play because he was good at the game and a decent enough person. Reese knew who he was, and the people did too. Because they knew each other, he understood Robinson’s slump, and he understood the crowd’s ire. So, he matched them. He didn’t match their emotion. He matched the subject of their ire – Robinson. He could’ve at that point joined the crowd into the spiral of hatred and anxiety. Instead, he catalyzed a different connection to the crowd and Robinson, one of the baseball players and fans, rather than black vs. white.
Anxiety and hatred had no place on the baseball diamond that day. Instead, Reese used his connection to both groups to change their relationship to each other. Hating Robinson means hating Reese. Hating Reese means rethinking everything you have ever thought about Reese. Maybe that’s an easy jump for some. But the gamble is that for the majority, rethinking something or someone you love is harder than rethinking someone or something you hate. Because to hate Reese would mean that you hate all the things you love about baseball. If you decide to hate all those things about baseball, why watch the sport to begin with? If you no longer like the sport, why waste the energy to hate Robinson in the first place?
Hate vs. Love
Do you see all the steps you must go through to hold on to hate? Instead, you could choose to love baseball like you already do, and if Robinson is a part of baseball, is he good or bad at it? Then is he a good or bad person? You know what doesn’t matter anymore… whether he is black or white or brown or yellow. If he is hated (and respected), it is because he is winning like any other great player. If he is in a slump, his fans will want him to be better and criticize him as fans who love their teams do, whether their name is Reese or Robinson.
It is easier to choose love when connections are made.
That’s what Reese did. Nothing extra special or psychologically dominant, just a simple human connection.
To sum up, you spend integrity by maintaining a connection and a non-anxious presence. It’s in the name, non-anxious presence. You have to be present in your lack of anxiety. This process is what most of us know as kindness. Kindness expands space.
A Real Life Scenario
Watch the video for a personal story on how I failed at this. But here is a real-life scenario, too.
Let’s say your boss just received a huge pile of work for reasons somewhat out of his control. Every boss sets the team’s expectations by their example. If he is a good boss, he will get to work right away, pulling long hours and encouraging the team. But every worker should ask, “Is this work important and urgent for the long hours right now, or can we set a plan and take chunks off it over time?” Of course, this good boss will want to get it done now, but that isn’t the best answer from an anxiety standpoint. The boss is anxious about the increased workload and wants to offload the anxiety to you by forcing you and your coworkers (and himself) to work long hours. The non-anxious boss would stop, make a plan, acquire additional resources, and work to solve the problem. Maybe there is a short burst (sometimes things are on fire), but that is the exception to most bosses’ rule.
So what do you do?
You can do what you’re told. Most bosses appreciate that. But that’s not creating space, and ultimately, you are just succumbing to their anxiety. You are squeezing yourself to fit inside their constricting bubble. If you want to create space though, you can hear the anxiety and then choose not to get sucked in. What you do next is based on the match and the goal you want to arrive at. In this example, that means creating a list of prioritized tasks. Maybe you have to do a short burst, but then a plan is implemented to take the extra work on bit by bit. If you need help realizing what bit by bit looks like, Anne Lamott has a fabulous book called Bird by Bird. So your plan should match what you know from your boss. The plan then catalyzes a less anxious reaction because you and your boss aren’t working a zillion hours.
Overworking is often a sign of anxiety. Does it happen from time to time – yes. But the chronic overworkers, and you know them, are anxious about something. Maybe it’s perception, something at home, or something they know is ahead, but you don’t. But their overwork is an anxiety response. And you don’t have to get sucked in. You can be better and do better.
There is always work to be done, but the best bosses lead by example and ensure they and their employees don’t do too much.
Faithful Fatherhood
Why does this matter? Overwork and anxiety are a faith (belief + action = faith) to many Americans. They practice them, and the high performers are better at practicing their anxiety. That faith gets passed on to their children and their grandchildren. Faith is an integral part of family systems.
In the case above, the belief was the need to accomplish the most work immediately. The action was to overwork. The faith is anxiety processed at work.
This Substack is all about the intersection of faith and fatherhood. That means taking the time to understand how our beliefs shape us. I want you to be able to see that and then choose to change if you wish. The importance is not necessarily how our faith shapes us, but how our children are shaped. No matter what, we pass on our faith to our children. So think about what that means. Maybe you need a change.
So, to change your faith, start by practicing a non-anxious presence. That begins by having integrity, being non-anxious, and then spending that integrity.
Does your faith create space or shrink it? Is that working for you?
I have a few questions for you.
I look forward to writing to you next week. How was the video? Did the idea of overwork repulse you? Could you accept working fewer hours to have a more balanced life? For the leaders who read this, what is your example setting in your workplace, or for those who lead? Jesus of Nazareth once said, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.” Could that mean there will always be work, and we have to set our minds on a path that leads with less anxiety?
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