Tenderfooted, Tenderhearted People

It's summer--time for bare feet in the grass, on the sand, and soaking in the water.  But you don't want bare feet on gravel, hot pavement, or (for Die Hard fans) on broken glass.  Barefooting is great in certain situations, but not in others--because even folks with calloused feet hurt themselves from time to time.  

A tenderfoot is a person with unusually soft soles on their feet.  The term is also used to refer to a person who is new to a job or an organization.  It used to refer to people who were new to living on the frontier--city slickers who were used to wearing shoes all the time.  They would be called "tenderfoot" until they had literally developed callouses on their feet, or until they had become figuratively calloused to frontier life.

Today, I think a lot of people are tenderfooted when it comes to conversational skills.  It seems these days it's difficult to discuss things we hold dear, without being offended or hurting other people's feelings.  Recently, somebody commented to me about how we're taught not to discuss religion or politics--but what we really need to be taught is how to have a civil conversation.  We need to learn how to be sensitive to the feelings of others--and how not to have fragile feelings ourselves.

As we walk this earth, it's easy to get our feet cut by the sharp comments of others.  One solution would be to cover the whole earth in bubble wrap--but that could be suffocating, couldn't it?  Shantideva, the eighteenth century Indian scholar, said maybe you could cover the world with leather so that you could walk more safely.  But...

"Where would there be leather enough to cover the entire world? With just the leather of my sandals, it is as if the whole world were covered. Likewise, I am unable to restrain external phenomena, but I shall restrain my own mind. What need is there to restrain anything else?"

I can't cover the world--but I can cover my feet.  This means that while it's impossible to make the world a softer place, it is possible to protect my heart and mind.  What's the leather I can use to cover my tender feet?  It's called LOVE.  By putting on love, I can keep my tender heart safe, and protect others as well.  1 Corinthians 13:4-7 (NLT) says:

Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out.  Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. 

Love is a power that heals the cuts and bruises made by others.  It also guards your tender feet and heart so that you won't be so easily offended by people--because you'll be walking with them in Jesus' sandals instead of your own shoes.  No, you can't cover the world in leather so it won't cut you.  But when you cover yourself in love, God will give you angels to help you, "lest you dash your foot against a ston[y hearted person]."  This means you realize that you can't change the world, but you can change yourself.  You can't cover the world, but you can cover your heart and mind with love.  And by doing so, you'll be able to be tread lightly among tenderfooted people, and have your heart protected, at the same time.

Photo credit: "Bare feet" by zhang_yiwei is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Photo credit: "002-365 footwear" by cukuskumir is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

How to Have Conversations with Other Humans

During COVID-19, have you forgotten how to talk with other humans?  No, really--that's a serious question.  If you've been quarantining, working from home, unemployed, flattening the curve, and living inside your bubble, then chances are, you've had a smaller circle of people that you're talking with lately.  Social distancing isn't just staying six feet away--it's also keeping extended families apart, friends away, and made coworkers just another face on Zoom.  All this isolation can make you lose your "people skills."  Social media may be your primary form of communication these days.  And, based on the way folks interact on those platforms, it seems all our social skills have taken a nose-dive.

Add to that, the fact that it's election season for Americans.  This has increased tensions between friends and family members who may see things from different perspectives.  It seems that people have forgotten how to have civil disagreement these days.  So, maybe we need a refresher on how to have conversations with other humans.

Sometimes it's not WHAT is said, but HOW things are said that make the difference between a broken relationship and a healed one.  I'd never suggest that you abandon your cherished opinions, but perhaps with the right OARS, we can paddle through the rough waters of difficult conversations.

In William Miller and Stephen Rollnick's counseling technique called Motivational Interviewing, practitioners utilize four key skills, called OARS.  These OARS aren't just skills for counselors--they're just good communication skills for humans to have conversation with one another.  The acronym stands for Open-ended questions; Affirmations, Reflections, and Summaries.

Open-Ended Questions

Instead of asking "yes" or "no" questions that invite only a simple answer, try asking questions that really elicit a detailed response.  You'll learn more from the other person if you can get them talking.  You might try questions like:

• "Can you tell me about__________?"
• "What would it look like if _______?"
• "What do you think about_______?"

"Yes" or "no" questions can make people shut down instead of opening up.  A good conversationalist uses open-ended questions instead.

Affirmations

Affirmations are more than compliments--because they're true.  Affirmations are not flattery--they are observations and appreciations about a person or their perspective.  When you give someone an affirmation, it makes them feel built-up, and it encourages them to continue the conversation.  You might try:

• "You really seem to value ________."
• "You're really good at_________."
• "I'm impressed that you___________."

Everybody likes to talk with somebody who appreciates them.  Just make sure your affirmations are sincere, because flatter will get you nowhere in a genuine conversation.

Reflections

People want to know that they're heard.  And you need to know that you're hearing them correctly.  If you didn't understand them, you want to know that, too, so that they can clarify anything you misunderstood. You might use phrases like...

• "It sounds like you're saying_________."
• "It seems like____________."
• "If I'm hearing you right, _______________."

When you reflect back to somebody what you think you're hearing, you can make sure that you understand them.  They can also know that they're being heard.  And people who feel heard want to keep on talking.

Summaries

Whether it's at the end of a conversation, or at a turning point in a conversation, it's useful to summarize what someone has been talking about.  Summaries are kind of like reflections, but they are geared toward what comes next.  They make good transitions--either shifting toward the end of the conversation or moving to a different topic.  Summaries look like:

• "We've talked about ____.  What else is important to you?"
• "From our conversation, I've learned ____ and ____."
• "I'm glad we've established________."

Summaries help you maintain your focus in a conversation.  An unfocused chat may be fine sometimes, but true understanding takes intention.

In times like these, when isolation makes you lose your "people skills" or when political tensions threaten the loss of friendships, it's important to practice good conversational skills.  Talking is more than just speaking--it's listening.  It's asking good questions.  It's paddling skillfully through an interaction so that you enjoy the journey, see the scenery of another person's soul, and hopefully come to understanding.  


Photo credit 1:  "Talking on the edge in Zurich"by Alexandre Dulaunoy is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

Photo crecit 2: "Paddle" by ArnelGenterone is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

"Icebergs Ahead! But Don't Be Afraid."

"I'm not prejudiced," he said, "because I like rap music, Mexican food, and Asisn art.  Right?  I mean, I even have black friends, and my church did a mission trip to work with the Indians (American or South Asian, I can't remember which).  I was raised not to see color, to treat everybody as equal, and I raised my kids that way, too.  So I can't be prejudiced.  Pass that label on to somebody else--maybe that guy over there with his head shaved, flying the Swastika.  Yeah, that's what prejudice looks like--right?"

Most good people would hope that this is true.  But if we take a closer look, we just might find that deep inside, all of us have picked up a touch of prejudice somewhere along the way.

Now, as soon as I say this, I know some of you will get defensive.  I'm not talking about black versus white.  I'm talking about prejudice on all cultural levels.  So please--take a look at this pretty picture and then hear me out.

The Cultural Iceberg depicts two levels of a person's culture.  Floating on top is Surface Culture: those aspects of a person's culture that can be easily discerned by others who are not in the same culture.  These are things such as food, flags, festivals, fashion, holidays, music, performances, dances, games, arts and crafts, literature, and languages.  When a person sees another culture, these are the things that they see on the surface.  A person may enjoy aspects of another culture that float above the surface, and therefore they may deem themselves to be "not prejudiced." 

But look beneath the surface, and you see the more massive level of Deep Culture.  You may enjoy another culture's restaurants, for example, but have a hard time grasping elements of their Deep Culture.  You may judge them, consciously or subconsciously, based on these things.

Deep Culture involves communication styles and rules.  This includes facial expressions, gestures, eye contact, personal space, touching, body language, tone of voice, handling and display of emotion, and conversation patterns.  When I was eighteen, I was walking with a dear male friend in a shopping mall.  Having recently come from Palestine, he reached over and took my hand as we strolled together.  I understood the social norm in Arab culture, but my teenage prejudice and homophobia kicked in, and I immediately dropped his hand.  Imagine how foolish I sounded as I tried to explain to him how my cultural and sexual fragility required that I reject his gesture of friendship! 

Deep Culture involves notions of courtesy and manners, friendship, leadership, cleanliness, modesty, and beauty.  An example of this would be white culture's frequently equating blondness with beauty.  I mean, in jokes and music, all they have to say is, "this blonde walked into the room," and everybody just knows she's gorgeous.  Poor brunette white women!  And (given this reference) too bad for beautiful women of color, who apparently don't measure up!  This isn't something people think about, or even notice on a surface level.  It's hidden, beneath the surface of our conscious minds.  And it can be a source of prejudice.

Deep Culture involves concepts of self; time; past and future, fairness and justice; roles related to age, sex, class, family, etc.  You may not consider yourself racist, but you may judge somebody from a different country as rude based on their flexibile schedule keeping.  You may not think you're prejudiced, but you may think that someone of a different culture is overreacting to unjust situations, becoming more incensed where you might be more reserved.  You might not consider yourself racially biased, but you might say that people of another culture are "immoral" because they don't have the same sexual or romantic values as your culture.

Deep Culture involves attitudes towards elders, adolescents, dependents, rule exceptions, work, authority, cooperation vs, competition, relationships with animals, age, sin, and death.  I grew up in a home with two generations: parents and children.  Across the road from us lived a family from a different culture, with four generations in the home.  I thought that was weird because I didn't understand either the economic necessity or the generational togetherness that they enjoyed.  Because I viewed things from my own cultural standard, I labeled their experience as "less than" my own.  I wouldn't have considered myself prejudiced--I played with those same kids.  But I didn't "get" their family structure, and subconsciously judged them for it.

Deep Culture involves approaches to relgion, courtship, marriage, raising children, decision-making, and problem-solving.  When I was growing up, a family in my church hosted a foreign exchange student from Thailand.  They told him that as long as he lived under their roof, he was going to attend church.  They believed that theirs was a missionary effort to save his soul, but they couldn't see how their demand potentially violated his own beliefs and culture.  I was so proud of my Baptist dad for taking him to the Buddhist temple, which was hours away!  That showed real cultural sensitivity.

In our society, on the surface, there's an overarching message that we're not supposed to be prejudiced--that we should judge someone "not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."  This sounds good--and it was a wonderful message by Rev. King, and pertinent for its day.  But we need to be very aware that it's not just the color of someone's skin that we judge.  We can be raised "not to see color," but have cultural biases that judge the content of people's character based on Deep Culture that lies beneath the surface.  

When you realize that the differences between you and the other person aren't flaws in their character, but distinctives of their culture, you can be more embracing and less prejudiced.  The fact is, everybody has a certain amount of cultural bias.  The trick isn't eliminating it completely, but recognizing it for what it is, and then being willing to suspend that judgment for the sake of relationship.  Everybody is prejudiced.  We all pre-judge, based on differences.  But if we embrace differences as interesting and valuable, rather than threatening, then maybe we can pre-judge other folks as friends rather than enemies.  Yes, there are icebergs ahead--but don't be afraid.  We can navigate this.

Blessed are the Pacifiers?

If you're readying this, then by now you should have outgrown pacifiers.  Everybody knows it's bad for your teeth, and I cringe every time I see a full-fledged child (not a baby) with a pacifier in their mouth.  And, did you know that you can buy adult-sized pacifiers on Amazon?  What is this world coming to?

When Jesus said, "Blessed are the peacemakers," he didn't mean pacifiers.  Yes, it's true that both of these words stem from the Latin word pax, meaning "peace."  But there's a vast difference between the two.  When he said this, he knew that his listeners lived under the Pax Romana (Peace of Rome), a system of oppression that brought about peace through domination and oppression.  So he had to make sure his hearers understood the difference beween people who make peace, and people who are pacified, or who pacify other folks.

A pacifier is something you give a baby, in order to keep them from crying.  You're "peacifying" them for your own good, so you don't have to hear them scream.  In this sense, it's not really peace at all--but simply the absence of noise.  A pacifier is something you give a hurting or hungry baby--to shut them up.  My Scottish foster sister used to call a pacifier a "dummy-tit," which is a nipple for dummies who don't know the difference between a piece of plastic and the real thing.

Jesus said, "Blessed are the peacemakers," and that's a different thing altogether.  Peacemakers are NOT pacifiers.  They don't throw out platitudes to keep people happy.  Instead of saying, "Can't we all just get along?" real peacemakers do the hard work of actually listening to the cries of their hurting neighbors.  Instead of saying, "You're hurting?  I'm hurting too--let me tell you about my pain..." (a tactic designed to shut the other person up), real peacemakers simply sit and listen.  Whether they agree with the story that the other person tells or not, they make sure that the really hear their neighbor, and make sure that their neighbor knows they're heard.

I've gotta admit--pacifiers are easy.  When I was raising babies, I gave them all pacifiers.  But pacifiers are something we should outgrow.  Once a kid is old enough to talk, the pacifier should come out of their mouth.  Kids need to quit using them--and adults need to quit trying to give them to young people who are fully capable of conversation.  Because real dialogue is better than a pacifier.

Are you having trouble in your marriage, and this message is hitting home because you realize you've been a pacifier instead of a peacemaker?  Have you been troubled by racial injustice, but you've been unable to really deal with the seismic weight of actually dealing with it--so you've been saying "all lives matter" rather than sitting down to listen to stories of black pain?  Have you been changing the topic every time a friend brings up a difficult conversation, because you just don't want to deal with it?  Jesus blessed the peacemakers because their courage to have a conversation leads to the kingdom of God manifesting in the lives of hurting and hungry people.  I hope you'll have the guts to be a peacemaker, rather than a pacifier--that you'll take the time to listen.