It’s timely to re-post today one of the most popular posts ever on my blog, or top 10 at least. Morgan’s got another jog-a-thon in the morning (Thursday) and it brings back a lot of memories documented here. She’s still nervous about it, because like one of her parents she takes everything super seriously 🙂 This post was originally posted on November 5, 2010.
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Another huge lesson on empowerment was hammered home to me today, again through my daughter. She did her school fundraiser jog-a-thon this morning. For most kids this is no big thing. But Morgan has mild cerebral palsy and wears a small brace on her right leg. In general her muscle strength is not nearly as strong as her peers because of C.P.Today was amazing on one level because we went from Morgan not running in P.E. (see P.E. Empowerment) to her now jogging/walking for 30 minutes straight.
Each lap was about 1/10 of a mile or so. Morgan thought she could do 5. That was her goal. I thought she could easily do that walking, but I thought 10 was the max for her.
She did 13. (about 1 1/4 miles)
She said her leg was hurting in the middle and that was when she slowed it down a bit, but she ran most of the last 3 laps she did and finished strong. She’s feeling like hot stuff right now (another side affect from empowered behavior and accomplishment!).
But the powerful lesson was on the sidelines for me. My wife and I and my parents were there in support, in response to Morgan’s request, and we were a total wreck emotionally. Christine was crying before lap 1. My mom didn’t make it to lap 2.It might be hard for you to get it, but as an analogy (maybe a poor one) I would say it would be equivalent to what you would feel if your son or daughter had a speech impediment and they participated in a speech contest. Or what you might feel at a high school graduation if the kid had a learning disability and struggled to keep passing grades, but managed to overcome and graduate.
Watching a girl who has had on average 1-2 physical therapy appointments for the past four years in order to build strength, leg coordination and flexibility, and learning to exercise control over her leg get out there and push herself to run to the best of her ability and then to finish strong the last 3 laps is pretty much enough to do you in. I was drained at the end and more tired than Morgan.
Here’s the lesson. Watching her push herself, struggle through her own pain, and battle her own limitations generated certain responses within me (and those with me, no names of course!). There’s an instinctive desire to take the pain away. To say, “It’s ok, you’ve done great, but you don’t have to keep running if you’re hurting.” Or to even get out there with her and support her (I had visions of that British sprinter and his father in the Olympics a decade ago!).
But if I had given into those instincts you know what I would have missed?
I would have missed watching her running the last 3 laps harder than the first 3 laps.
I would have missed watching her and her friend Zoe encouraging each other and motivating each other to keep running until the whistle blew those last few laps.
I would have missed hearing her laugh on her final lap with joy that comes with knowing that she conquered something that she was pretty nervous about all week.
I would have missed experiencing a moment where she leaned over to me and said, “Dad! I did 13 laps!”
I would have missed the feeling I’ve had all day of being proud not just of who she is, but of how determined she was to do her best and push herself as much as she could when she could easily have taken an easy out.
I might have ruined an otherwise very empowering experience for my daughter.
Here’s where pain and empowerment come together:
If you can’t manage YOUR OWN capacity to tolerate and handle pain and struggle in others, you WILL FAIL in empowering others. You will hamstring them through an unregulated empathy and compassion. Major parenting lesson here for those of us in that stage of life!
Obviously, there are times to pour on the love and empathy. But when others are capable of, and even responsible for, standing on their own – we must let them. We must encourage them, but we must not protect them from pain to the degree that they never learn how to persevere through it or even overcome it.
This is a hard lesson. It’s hard because it hurts. The question for us as leaders and human beings is this:
When we are engaging to take care of others or rescue them, are we doing it to take away their hurt…..Or are we really trying to take away our own?
Let’s help people become ABLE and not DISable them through unrestrained empathy.
How do you navigate the tension between letting people struggle in a good way and in a developmental way versus intervening to bring comfort and care when it is needed?
You see Colin in the picture with Morgan. He was very sad the first half of the race because he couldn’t run. Without about 12 minutes to go we turned him loose and he held his own though he looked like a field mouse amidst the other kids. He ran straight the whole time (with water break stops) and ended up cracking off about 6-7 laps himself in the last 12 minutes. One of the more memorable moments was him grabbing a water cup and drinking it on the run and then throwing the cup with its remaining water into the air like a legit marathon runner. Too funny.
Great job Morgan! (and Colin too!)
Thanks to those of you who sponsored her!
