Early in my career I started to worry about my clients. I obsessed on their troubles searching for ways that I could be more helpful. I worried that I might be saying something wrong, that I didn’t know enough, that I wasn’t being directive enough or that I was being too directive and not letting them find their own way because I was eager to end my own discomfort.
When I burned out on worry I became cynical…a slow resentful anger about bad things happening to good people, about parents ruining their children’s lives, about selfish bully type people making life miserable for all the nice folks. I became hard.
And then I learned about a literary style called The Hero’s Journey. In most stories the protagonist is the hero. He or she has a goal and through a series of good and bad events the hero not only accomplishes the goal but becomes much more enlarged and capable. They gain powers, strengths, knowledge and relationships that they did not have at the beginning of the journey.
The story is just getting good when something bad happens. That is the gripping, hair-raising part where we would never put the book down or pause the movie. The obstacle and setback is the thing that makes us care. And how our hero deals with the challenge is the thing we grow to love about them. The hero’s life now has meaning.
We are the heroes in our stories. We bring meaning and depth to our lives by overcoming life challenges. So I never worry about my clients anymore. When people come to me suffering I say to myself “oh, this is the good part”.
1 Comment on "This is the Good Part"
You always have the best anecdotes! I love this one and your "Daughter of a King" story.