The Only Constant is Change (Round 2)

| May 23, 2013 | One comment
Twitt

I’ve walked around the outside edge of the CN Tower (twice), I’ve ziplined, hang glided, given a TEDx talk, asked for what I needed, said no, said yes, and jumped out of a plane.

You’d think by now I’d be used to risk, change and new beginnings. I don’t think it ever gets easier, but I truly believe we all get better for the experience(s).

I’m nervous, thrilled, overwhelmed, honoured and so very excited to share that as of June 10, 2013 I will be taking on a new role as Manager, Student and Campus Life at Seneca College. This role is an amazing opportunity to build on the successes I’ve enjoyed over the past two and a half years, while also offering brand new challenges that will push and stretch me in ways that frighten yet exhilarate me all at once.

In taking the time to sit with and sit in this change, I remembered a post I wrote over a year ago when I made the transition from career services to student development at UOIT. In that post I shared lessons learned from “jumping in the deep end and learning how to swim.” In reviewing these lessons now, with the benefit of another year of hindsight and the anticipation of a new path to follow, I wanted to share what is perhaps an updated set of insights into what it means to not only leap, jump or dive into change, but to dance your way right through it.

1. It’s still not okay to avoid change, but now it’s even more okay to be scared of it. 

At the start of this journey, and all the way through it until sitting down to write this post, I was scared. Terrified. Very afraid. Petrified of everything and anything. But, you know what? That’s okay. Change is scary. It’s ripping the familiar out from under you and uprooting everything you worked so hard to plant. It’s emotional whiplash that strikes when you least expect it and when you think you’re not ready (more on that below). But what was actually the scariest part for me wasn’t the change itself, it was how I felt about it. I’ve mentioned before my own struggles with anxiety, and this was by no means an exception. Finally, after a particularly intense round of shadow boxing the fear demons, one single thought emerged as I lay KO’d on the mat:

I do not need the extra and unneeded burden of blame and shame for feeling what I feel. This is the way I feel, and this is enough. There is no ‘right’ way to feel about what’s happening because no one else can feel exactly what I feel or walk the exact same path. Who I am, where I’ve been, what I’ve done and what I’ve felt make me, and my feelings, unique. I will stop wasting energy on being mad for being mad, or sad for being sad, and instead focus my precious energy on sitting in the change, working through it, and learning from it. I am enough, this is enough, and I will be okay.

2. There is absolutely  never, ever (and I mean never) going to be a ‘good time’ to do anything. Period. 

This truly hit home for me after I said ‘yes’ to the new job. Waiting kills potential and is a thief of opportunity. You’ll never find a perfect moment or the best time because ‘perfect’ and ‘best’ are ever changing ideals we put on continuously growing pedestals. The more we keep them out of reach, the easier it is to avoid doing things that scare us. Yes, I was waiting for perfect but I kept changing the definition of what perfect was so I never had to get there. I was fooling myself and you’re doing it too. Stop. Right now. Right now is perfect. You are the best person at the best time. The world needs you to dare and try. Today.

3. “You can’t jump out of a plane until you’re at 18,000 feet.” 

My good friend James (the one who went sky diving with me), texted me this amazing piece of advice when I got nervous (again) recently.

I have been gifted with so many awesome moments and experiences over the past five months of 2013, and I have relished every single one. Each moment, however, is preceded by a series of smaller moments filled with anticipation. Will I? Won’t I? Should I? Why now? Each little question takes away just a bit more energy until there is nothing left for the moment itself. Even worse, each question robs you of the chance to experience the journey, to walk the path and to celebrate all it took to get you on that path in the first place. You’re going to have to walk the path, climb the stairs and maybe even go through hell to get there, but jumping out of that plane (or, in this case, accepting that job offer) is going to be amazing. Let’s stop getting stuck in mental purgatory and learn to love the (mental) limbo.

To paraphrase the great philosopher and scholar David Bowie again, I don’t yet know where exactly I’m going from here, but I absolutely promise it won’t be boring. Expect lots of questions, insights, bad jokes, even worse musical references from the 90s and a whole lot of awesome. I’m so excited to see what’s next, and I’m even more excited to share in it with you.

Category: Life As I Know It

Living Colourfully: How To Blend Your I’s and E’s

| May 22, 2013 | One comment
Twitt

A very special thanks to the awesome Sue Caulfield for her inspiration, ideas and artistry on this collaborative post. Read her blog here.

As a fun aside, you’ll probably notice where Sue hands off writing to me by my obvious re-spelling of ‘colour’ eh? 

One of the very first lessons you are tasked with learning in an art class is the concept of the Color Wheel.



Primary colors are red, yellow and blue. Secondary colors are orange, green and purple. When two primary colors are mixed you can create a secondary color.

Red + Yellow = Orange

Yellow + Blue = Green

With the excitement of creating new shades and hues comes a warning from the teacher; “Don’t combine colors on opposite ends of the Color Wheel. They don’t mix well together.”

Purple and yellow? Brownish gray. Orange and blue? Grayish brown.

The Color Wheel was a tool I learned to trust in my early days as an artist. I relied on the guidelines, staying away from testing out combinations that had grayed out results.

 

Still, I wondered, what was so bad about this combination? Sure, it might be a little rough on the eyes at first, but I was never one to stay away from the boldness of color. I tested these theories out in some of my later works. I found drew inspiration from artists that seemed to feel the same.


One of Sue’s favorite artists, Elizabeth Murray, “Do The Dance”

Working with someone who is the opposite of your MBTI type can be similar to working with opposing colors  on the Color Wheel. Each type brings a unique value to the whole picture. When opposing colors play off each other, they can bring vibrant movement, balance and provide symmetry within a piece. The piece uses the strengths of each hue to enhance the beauty of the work as a whole.

However, this balance is not easy to achieve. If one shade overpowers another,  a brownish gray mess occurs. The result is weakness instead of strength, and the piece is stripped of what could have been a potential masterpiece. It is easy to choose a shade that you are comfortable with as an introvert or extrovert, and ignore the “colors of others” in your personal or professional life.


Passing the palette to Lisa!

 

Though perhaps far less artistically inclined, the metaphor of a colour (I’m Canadian if you couldn’t tell) wheel is a fantastic descriptor for working with Introverts. As someone with a very strong preference for Extroversion, our need to externally process and apparent comfort in socializing can liken us to the brighter, bolder colours in the wheel. Conventional wisdom argued we weren’t meant to mix with the ‘softer’ colours, as they would only dilute our strength and polluting our lightness. Those other colours, the pastels perhaps, were an unneeded and ugly weight. Even on their own, they were a toned down, less noticeable version of who we were and who we could be. If only they were a little bit brighter.



Conversely, our loud, over the top hues as Extroverts could be far more blinding than enticing. We can be like blinking neon lights, restlessly demanding attention and always on – always buzzing with ideas and opinions that everyone ends up knowing about. Like plugging into a perpetual power source, our neon sign is continually charged by interaction, creating a cycle of giving and receiving energy from anyone and everyone who walks by and takes notice. We love people, and want you to love us too.

These contrary, colourful descriptions ignore all of the shade gradients on the colour wheel – and for good reason. Too often, Extroversion and Introversion are seen as ‘black and white’ concepts, dull in definition yet uniquely vibrant in practice. You are either one or the other, and, depending on what leadership book you read or ‘how to’ manual for advancing in your profession you follow, probably the wrong one.

 

Working with colleagues and students identifying a strong preference for Introversion over the past year has added many new colours to my student support pallete. While perhaps a more subdued colour or a more subtle tone, Introversion offers meaningful opportunities for deeper, more careful introspection that patiently waits for the observer to notice the fine detail in their masterpiece, rather than rushing broad brush strokes on canvas. Introverts remind me to take time away and help remove the stigma of being alone. They tease apart ‘being alone’ from ‘loneliness’, often keeping me accountable in my own self care. They remind us, and myself more often since I need it, that the artist requires as much, if not more, care as their paint brushes, crayons or clay.

Continuing the metaphor, the canvas that we display our work, our hopes, our wishes and perhaps even ourselves on is perpetually unfinished. It requires both the bold strokes and the fine lines, the maddening chaos of colour and the subtle nuances of lightness to create a masterful, if not always a masterpiece, life. We don’t need to draw Introverts out of the shadows, nor must the Extroverts step out of the sun. The interplay of light and dark, bright and more subtle hues, draws the most beautiful picture.


Category: Uncategorized

Turning The Clock Faster

| May 13, 2013 | One comment
Twitt

I was an invited guest on a careers panel two weeks ago as part of our Graduate Student Council’s annual conference. While the audience was different (graduate students instead of the undergraduate students I more often work with) the questions were the same.

“All of the jobs I apply for require more years of experience than I have, but I can’t get the job without having that much experience. How am I supposed to get the experience they want if they won’t give me the chance to accumulate the amount of experience they’re looking for?”

The eternal debate. The ongoing question. The vicious cycle.

I’ve heard (and given) many of the typical answers to this question.

Volunteer. Ask for more responsibility in your current role. Network and seek out other opportunities. Rework your resume to best showcase your skills and education.

One of the panelists on last week’s panel, however, had a far more interesting response.

Turn the clock faster. 

To badly paraphrase, the panelist (an entrepreneur and high ranking executive on an international engineering professional society), spoke of fitting more experiences and, consequently, more development, into a shorter amount of time. As experience and the learning it offers comes in time, he argued, graduating students need to start ‘turning the clock faster’ to rush their development.

On the surface, every single molecule of my Student Affairs training screamed out in protest. Development can’t be rushed! Everyone walks their own path! Learning is not a sprint! How could anyone possibly advocate for rushing the student experience?

Except maybe we’re already doing that.

We spend a lot of time in Student Affairs talking about development and growth.  Both terms have process or progress in their definitions, implying a gradual journey between externally defined stages. We insert ourselves, and rightly so, into the whole student experience, following a path from orientation to graduation (and often beyond), hoping to impact each step along the way.

Being fortunate enough to watch students progress through a multi-year journey, we talk of students’ ‘readiness’ for experiences. Not yet, not now, but soon. Slow and steady wins the race.

In our own professional development, we talk openly about making mistakes and about failure. We praise trying something, anything, over inaction. Standing still makes us antsy and we advocate for progress, not perfection.

I used to continually berate myself for not enjoying the moment, for not slowing down and reflecting on both where I am and where I’m going. Now, I get stuck in a strange developmental limbo – longing for progress but yearning for patience. Do we do this to our students too?

I have no answer (yet) for how to solve this dilemma, but the idea of ‘turning the clock faster’ suddenly doesn’t seen so bad if, as we sometimes discover, the hands aren’t moving at all.

Life Short Long

Life’s too short to worry. Life’s too long to wait.

 

Category: Professional Development

A Seat at the Table

| April 29, 2013 | 6 comments
Twitt

Saturday morning, I walked into a church for the first time in many, many years. While our beliefs are worlds apart, I couldn’t fathom not being there for one of my best friends as his over seven year path to the priesthood culminated in a beautiful ceremony. I’m saving thoughts and reflections about our journey through spirituality and friendship for another post (and after I’ve had more time to truly reflect on the day and the history that brought us there), but I wanted to share a brief thought about something else today.

The bishop giving the homily at the mass spoke of service. He asked a question from the gospel that has very real implications for higher education and our work in student affairs.

“Who is greater? The one who sits at the table, or the one who serves”

At first glance, the answer seems simple. Leadership as service is a popular conception, and with good reason. We speak of the role of a leader as one who serves and works in service of a greater good or goal. This higher calling of a leader is, paradoxically for some, to act in ‘lowly’ service.

This question, however, implies that those who sit at the table remain fixed and stubborn in their position. Their is an implied dichotomy that one who sits at the table cannot, or will not, trade places with or make room for one who has yet to pull up a chair. Sitting at the table seems to imply a level of privilege and status, neither of which are cast in the most positive of lights. The moral of this short story seems to be act and lead, or sit and do nothing.

Is it possible to serve while sitting at the table? 

As I continue to progress through my career in student affairs, I’ve seen leadership in action take many forms. My introduction to the field was through the ‘in the trenches’ work this question highlights – spending long hours setting up and taking down events, arriving on campus almost before the sun was up for orientation and spending time with as many students as possible for more hours than there are in a typical day. Now, I spend more time in meetings and at my desk than I do on the front lines. Does this mean I am serving students less? Is my service quantifiably different now?

I’ve come to see my time ‘at the table’, whether the boardroom oval or my desk, as a new avenue for impact. I may not be working directly with students in real time, but I still see my work behind the scenes as service. There is of course a unique and privileged power I possess being able to send emails and make phone calls that impact our students’ experience, but I see it as an opportunity to expand the breadth and reach of my work, in service, ultimately (as I think it should be) for our students.

What about you? Can you be at the table and still be of service to your students?

Can you serve by sitting?

Category: Leading, Leaders and Leadership

Make Your Project Your People

| April 9, 2013 | No comments
Twitt

It’s another most wonderful time of the year … for me anyways. A time of great joy, considerable angst, nerves, stress, excitement and accomplishment.

It’s time for student elections!

Call it an association or a union, students who participate in this level of student government have such a fantastic opportunity for development and an equally large opportunity for disappointment. There are grandiose plans for “what we’ll do differently this year”, coupled with an almost overzealous desire to downplay or outright ignore the work done by those before them. Often, what happened before no longer matters. The contributions of their predecessors aren’t celebrated, but rather leveraged as campaign promises, offering ‘change’ that will only cost you a few seconds at the ballot box.

As a former student union executive (SCSU VP Campus Life 2006-2007), I’ve seen first hand this conflicting and competing mindset. Every new executive wants to do better for the students, but wants to do it their way – the new way, the best way.

In a conversation with a new student society executive earlier this week where the same message appeared again. This student is already a superstar – bright, motivated and already doing great things as one of our student staff members. He seemed worried, however, that those working with and for him wouldn’t ‘buy into’ his plans, holding the same excitement he had for the year ahead. More importantly, he mused, what would happen to him when he was gone? Would the new society executives ignore his accomplishments in favour of their own goals?

In that moment, my own fears and anxieties as a new student union executive (a few) years ago came flooding back. This time around, I had the gift of hard earned lessons on my side.

Whether you’re a new member of a student union, starting your first day at a new job or even getting out of bed for another new day …

Make Your Project Your People

Your job, my job, our job is not to create the longest reports or the most successful event. Our projects should not be measured in the number of program attendees or what it says on our performance review. It is our people, not our papers, that will keep a legacy alive and push our shared goal for student success forward. It is the people that create the successes we celebrate and share in the challenges that frustrate us. Even an assessment fanatic like myself must recognize that there is nothing to assess without action, and there is no action without those working alongside us. In building our people, we build a legacy.

If you or your students are looking for a project this month, this summer or this year, make it your people.

 

 

 

Category: Leading, Leaders and Leadership

Yesterday was World Autism Awareness Day

| April 3, 2013 | One comment
Twitt

… and I didn’t say a word.

Yesterday, Tuesday April 2, was World Autism Awareness Day, and the entire month of April is Autism Awareness Month. This is perhaps the first time ever where I have so much as acknowledged it.

Why?

My brother, Sean, is 21 years old. He has a very diverse taste in music, ranging from LMFAO to Marianas Trench to Buddy Holly to Sesame Street. He eats just about anything, but only when he feels like it (which is just about all the time). He loves basketball and hates loud noises. He’ll talk your ear off if you let him (the Endersby siblings are quite alike that way), but you may never quite understand what he’s saying.

My brother Sean is autistic.

Sean

Sean: Age 20

 

Sean was born with a series of physical challenges. He had a club foot that required a cast and special shoes for the first few years of his life. (Ask me about how cute I thought it was to get to sign his itty bitty cast when I was little). More seriously, Sean was born with a variation of Craniosynostosis, where the plates of his skull were fused together (rather than being held slightly apart in a more normal newborn’s skull), changing the way his skull could develop as he grew. Before Sean was even a month old, surgeons opened him up and worked to separate pieces of his skull, giving him a chance at a more normal development. He had a pretty rockin’ headband of staples and, as my earliest memory of my little brother reminds me, wires taped all over his tiny body.

We’ll never truly know (and it doesn’t really matter) if that operation so early in his life caused or triggered his autism. All I know now is that Sean is different, very different.

And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Becoming “fluent in Sean” (if you ever need a star player on a Thomas the Tank Engine trivia contest, just call) has taught me frustration in the bigger moments and joy in the small victories. I’ve seen pain, sure, but I’ve also seen incredible triumph.

But I didn’t speak up yesterday when a whole day was devoted to raising awareness about my brother Sean and this community I don’t think we as a family ever wanted to be a part of.

Because I’m tired.

I’m tired, like Sean is, like my parents are, of explaining away Sean’s differences and advocating for his sameness. It’s exhausting to live in a world where you can feel like everyone knows but no one understands.

And then I thought, if I feel this way, if Sean might feel this way, what about all our students who carry that same burden? Autistic or otherwise, every student we see and every colleague we wish a good morning to has packed their backpack, briefcase or purse not just with pens and wallets but with burdens and demons we may never see. We may see strange behaviours, actions or words that seem ‘weird’ or ‘different’, but those are only symptoms of an often bigger battle being waged just below a smiling surface.

So I let yesterday go without a word because championing awareness of something I still struggle to understand myself didn’t sit right. But I can’t, and probably will never stay silent when it comes to reminding you that we are more than what we say, or don’t say. We are much more than what we do, or choose not to. Stop and think before you tell me my brother is ‘different’. He’s more like you than you may ever know.

 

The Problem

Photo Credit: Imgur

Category: Life As I Know It

One Is Not Enough

| March 26, 2013 | No comments
Twitt

Coming back to earth (literally and figuratively) from a whirlwind couple of weeks that included launching our first Student Leadership Summit and another fantastic conference experience at NASPA Orlando, I’ve been reflecting on the number of times I’ve said two small words that are simply better together.

Thank You

Rather than muse about gratitude and the importance of sharing it freely and often (not that you shouldn’t, because you really, really should), my default thought process revolves around thinking of all the times someone helped me do something, gave me an idea to make something better or took on work that I couldn’t do … and feeling guilty about it.

I hate not feeling good enough. I despise not feeling smart enough. I spend too much time not feeling … enough. 

Each time someone offered a suggestion, I beat myself up for not thinking of it first. “Why didn’t I think of that? That’s so simple. They’re a much better professional than I am.”

Asking presentation partners or colleagues to take on large(r) parts of a task felt belittling, not liberating. “Why can’t I just do that? If I managed my time better I could have gotten it done. Why am I burdening them with extra work? I bet they think less of me now because I can’t get things done.”

If I had a friend who talked to me like I talked to myself these past couple of weeks, they would not be sharing my ice cream. (Trust me, sharing ice cream with me is an honour. I like ice cream. A lot). So what gives? How do I reframe? How will I give myself permission to be enough?

The only thing running through my head as I mulled over the question this morning was this:

I may not feel smart when I forget something that someone else remembers, or overlook a detail that someone else points out, but, I am smarter, and stronger, for not going it alone. I would rather be vulnerable and achieve more together than brave but limited alone. 

What about you? How do you feel ‘enough’? Leave me a comment or tweet me to talk about this more.

Category: Leading, Leaders and Leadership, Professional Development

Making Fun

| March 13, 2013 | No comments
Twitt

Thanks to Stacy Oliver for sharing and sparking some interesting (and very important) conversation yesterday.

Stacy

After reading the list, I tweeted back:

Capture

This “must follow” list includes several accounts meant to walk the line between satire and sarcasm, silly and slander. While I am and always will be an advocate for not taking ourselves too seriously and using humour as a stress buster & community builder, these parody accounts can still rub me the wrong way.

Humour can be a fantastic community builder. Strong ties are formed in crisis, but equally tight bonds are forged in celebration. Laughing together can bring us closer.

But what if you’re not in on the joke? Worse, what if the joke is about you?

Humour can also create vast chasms in relationships, another way to identify the out group that helps us define our in group community (I wrote more about in and out groups as they relate to community building here), while also shaming them for their differences.

Humour, parody, and sarcasm can be great icebreakers, but also fantastically powerful spirit-breakers. We laugh at tweets that identify deficiencies  differences or “wrong” ways of thinking, being, and doing in student affairs, walking a fine line between finding the humour in our everyday work and outright shaming others who currently reside in different developmental places.

Where I struggle the most with these parody accounts is how easily they can halt, rather than encourage, meaningful and developmental conversations. Reading someone else make fun of something you identify as something you do or believe in does not automatically prompt deep, reflective introspection – it triggers a need to defend and protect. 

How can we possibly expect anyone to be open to learning, development, and growth when they are too busy closing themselves off to protect themselves from shame and ‘making fun’? It’s hard to hear a new point of view when you’re feeling personally confronted, not professionally challenged.

How to we create space where we can be open to “what if” rather than constantly triggering a defense of the “what is”?

Category: Leading, Leaders and Leadership

When I and While I

| March 6, 2013 | One comment
Twitt

With so much to look forward to this month and this year, I’ve found myself starting more than a few sentences with “When I …”

“When I get to NASPA …” (Can’t wait to see everyone in Orlando!)

“When I have time …” (Because it seems to be in even shorter supply in March)

“When my leadership summit is over …” (Who thought logistical planning along with curriculum development at the same time was a good idea? Oh, right …)

“When the weather gets warmer …” (Seriously weather, enough with the cold.)

For each time I saw ‘when’, I fix my sights on the future, on a goal or event yet to come. I think long term but I think end result. I think about the final product.

“When I …” is exciting. The thrill of anticipation can keep us going and motivate us to work on short term tasks for long(er) term gain. “When” gives us something to aim for, to strive for – done right, “when” is the finish line at the end of our personal or professional marathon.

“When I …”, however, is also dangerous. We wait for when. We hold out for the next time, the better time, and the right time. When gets up on a pedestal as an ideal situation, place, or condition for action.

While we wait for when, let’s not forget the while.

“While I …” shifts the focus to process – the messy in-between. We work in while. Walking the path, we have opportunities to fail, chances to succeed, and moments of learning that make arriving at the when perhaps the least remarkable part of our journey. We develop skills, make connections and bring people along for the ride. We see, feel, and own the process, valuing the doing as much as, if not more than, the done.

Remember that it isn’t always about the destination. What does your journey look like? Will you start sentences today with “When I …” or “While I …”?

NOTE: I’m borrowing heavily in this post from my ‘Daring to Teach’ TEDx talk. Have a listen below:

Category: Leading, Leaders and Leadership

Most Of All, I Will Not Grow Up

| February 28, 2013 | One comment
Twitt

Grow Up

Blog title taken from Frank Turner’s ‘putting Lisa’s life philosophy in verse’ song Photosynthesis.  

“Most of all, I will not grow up.”

It’s like Frank Turner was singing about me. I often make comments starting with ‘when I grow up’ and poke (gentle) fun at friends who celebrate the more traditional rites and rituals that signal the passage into adulthood (marriage, the birth of a child, getting a ‘real’ job – whatever that is).

As I continue to gladly suffer from Peter Pan Syndrome, I thought it would be important to clarify what I mean when I say I refuse to grow up.

  •  I won’t be afraid to make mistakes and get messy (thank you Miss Frizzle). Children and those young at heart often shoot first and aim later, delighting in the art of discovery and remain curious, not cruel to themselves or others, when things don’t go according to plan.
  • I hope to always enjoy the ride – the bumpy twists and turns of life. Children are endlessly fascinated by adventure, and while holding on tight with one hand to a parent or other guardian, they still reach out with the other to seize the day. 
  • I hope to always be ridiculous. Ridiculously optimistic  Ridiculously enthusiastic about opportunities and ideas and adventures. Ridiculously supportive of everyone, whether I’ve known you for years or we’ve just met. A child is trusting but ultimately, in my mind, not naive. They are quick learners and given the chance will use their ridiculousness to inspire, motivate and energize others to step out, step back, and step into something new. 

8c98db6eee19766f571d7e7048f5ef0b

 

What about you? What does it mean to never grow up? Tell me in the comments below or tweet me your answer.

Category: Life As I Know It
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