Episode 495 - The Biggest Thing I learned In 2022

Welcome to Voices in My Head, the official podcast of me, Rick Lee James. I'm a recording artist, a singer, a songwriter, an author, a worship leader, and an ordained minister in the Church of the Nazarene. The Voices in My Head podcast is where I discuss music, movies, books, pop culture, theology, and more with friends, colleagues, and sometimes just by myself. Make sure to let me know what you think of today's episode by leaving me a review on iTunes or by tweeting at me @RickLeeJames on Twitter. And please join my mailing list at RickLeeJames.com where you can receive an email every time a new episode is released. By the way, in case you're interested in a daily dose of kindness and encouragement beyond this podcast, I also run the Twitter account @MrRogersSay where I post daily quotes from Fred Rogers, one of the voices in my head. Well, I guess that's it for the intro, so sit back, relax, and listen to the latest episode of Voices in My Head.

Well, hello everyone and welcome back to Voices in My Head. As always, I'm your host, Rick Lee James. I'm so glad you're here this week for what is going to be the final episode of 2022. I can't believe we're already here at this point. It has been quite a year for me, uh, spending half the year, uh, in school at Loyola University in Chicago in their Institute of Pastoral Studies, working towards my master's in medical chaplaincy, and then spending half of the year working as a chaplain in a CPE program in Kettering. And I was working on a Substack post, which you can follow if you don't at rickleejames.substack.com. For the end of the year, I'm going to be working a 24-hour shift on New Year's Eve, working a lot of hours this week. It seems like holiday hours I work more instead of less. When most people are getting a break. So that's just part of the, the CPE program. And I got thinking, I wonder what I could leave this year. I feel like a different person in many ways at the beginning and the end of 2022. We're quickly approaching our 500th episode of Voices in My Head, but honestly, music has gone to the side, podcasting has gone to the side this year. I've still kept them up I've still done things in both endeavors, but mostly it's been focused on what I needed to do to get this degree, to follow what I feel like is God's call in my life right now, which for whatever reason has been towards chaplaincy. So I started working on an article which has now turned into this podcast, The Biggest Thing I Learned in 2022. And really, it's It's less of my thoughts as just me giving them to you and more an article that I read and was given to us through the course of CPE that really, I think, has caused a complete paradigm shift in my life and my ministry, what I see ministry as being in many ways. So I wanted to share that with you today. In all my work as a chaplain this year, and the countless number of patients that I have seen, and spending time with staff in hospitals, and reading new books about this profession, and sitting in classroom didactics, of all of those things, I feel like this is the thing that has had the most influence, the biggest thing that I learned. And it came out of this article, which is called, uh, "The Gift of Presence: The Perils of Advice" by Parker J. Palmer. It was written in 2016. It was published on the website onbeing.org. And I thought, just as a way to close out the year, because it's been such a an influence on me, the concept of being a witness, rather than being a witness to people, but being a witness of people, I wanted to share this article with you. It's written again by Parker J. Palmer. They're not my original thoughts, but they are thoughts that are shaping me. And so here goes: The Gift of Presence, the Perils of Advice by Parker J. Palmer. He says, "When my mother went into a nursing home not long before she died, my wife and I were told that for a modest increase in the monthly fee, the staff would provide a few extra services to improve her quality of life. We gladly paid, grateful that we could afford it. Now in our mid-70s, my wife and I have no imminent need for assisted living or nursing care." But the house we live in is, by definition, a two-person residential facility for the aging. Here at what we fondly call "the home," it's not uncommon for one of us to try, uh, to try improve the other's quality of life by offering extra services. Unfortunately, those services often take the form of advice. A few years ago, my wife gave me some advice that struck me as how shall I say, superfluous. Remembering our experience with my mother, I said, "Could I pay a little less this month?" To this day, that line gives us a chance to laugh instead of getting defensive when one of us attempts, as both of us do now and then, to give the other unsolicited and unwanted help. Advice-giving comes naturally to our species and is mostly done with good intent, But, in my experience, the driver behind a lot of advice has as much to do with self-interest as interest in the other's needs, and some advice can end up doing more harm than good. Last week, I got a call from a man who'd recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer. He'd emailed his bad news to a few family members and friends, one of whom had come over right away. "How are you feeling?" his friend asked. "Well, as I said in my email, I'm feeling amazingly at peace with all this. I'm not worried about what lies ahead." The friend replied, "Look, you need to get a second opinion. At the same time, you should start exploring complementary medicine. You should also sign up for a meditation program, and I know a good book that can get you started down that path." I asked my caller how that response had made him feel. "I'm sure my friend meant well," he said, "but his advice left me less at peace." I told him I'd have felt the same way and offered this image: Imagine that I need support with a serious problem when along comes a guy with an advanced CPR certification. He is so eager to show off his skills that he isn't able to hear my true need. Instead, he starts administering chest compressions and rescue breathing, even though I'm perfectly able to breathe for myself. Now I have another big problem as I try to fight off the helper who's smothering me. I asked my caller how he would have felt if his friend had simply said, "How great that you're at peace. Tell me more." "That would have been wonderful," he replied. "But everyone I talked to had advice for me, including a relative who said I needed to join her church before it was too late." I asked how he'd been feeling recently. He said he'd been feeling afraid. "Do you want to talk about your year?" I asked. He talked while I listened and asked a few more questions. When we were done, he told me that some measure of peace had returned. It was a peace that had come from within him, not anything I'd said. I'd simply helped clear some rubble that blocked his access to his own soul. My misgivings about advice began with first experience of clinical depress— my first experience of clinical depression 35 years ago. The people who tried to support me had good intentions, but for the most part, what they did left me feeling more depressed. Some went for the nature cure. Why don't you get outside and enjoy the sunshine and fresh air? Everything is blooming and it's such a beautiful day. When you're depressed, you know intellectually that it's beautiful out there, but you can't feel a bit of that beauty because your feelings are dead.— and being reminded of that gap is depressing. Other would-be helpers tried to spruce up my self-image. "Why so down on yourself? You've helped so many people!" But when you're depressed, the only voice you can hear is one that tells you that you're a worthless fraud. Those compliments deepened my depression by making me feel that I'd defrauded yet another person. If he knew what what a worm I am, he'd never speak to me again. Here's the deal: the human soul doesn't want to be advised or fixed or saved. It simply wants to be witnessed, to be seen, heard, and companioned exactly as it is. When we make that kind of deep bow to the soul of a suffering person, our respect reinforces the soul's healing resources, the only resources that can help the sufferer make it through. Aye, there's the rub. Many of us helper types are as much or more concerned with being seen as good helpers as we are with serving the soul-deep needs of the person who needs help. Witnessing and companioning take time and patience, which we often lack, especially when we're in the presence of suffering so painful we can barely stand to be there, as if we were in danger of catching a contagious disease. We want to apply our fix, then cut and run, figuring we've done the best we can do to save the other person. During my depression, there was one friend who truly helped me. With my permission, Bill came to my house every day around 4 o'clock PM, sat me down in an easy chair, and massaged my feet. He rarely said a word, but somehow he found the one place in my body where I could feel a sense of connection with another person, relieving my awful sense of isolation while bearing silent witness to my condition. By offering me this quiet companionship for a couple of months, day in and day out, Bill helped save my life. Unafraid to accompany me in suffering, he made me less afraid of myself. He was present, simply and fully present, in the same way one needs to be at the bedside of a dying person. It's at such a bedside where we finally learn that we have no fix or save to offer those who suffer deeply. And yet we have something better: our gift of self in the form of personal presence and attention, the kind that invites the other's soul to show up. As Mary Oliver has written, This is the first, the wildest, and the wisest thing I know: that the soul exists and is built entirely out of attentiveness. I leave you with two pieces of advice: a flagrant self-contradiction for which my only defense is Emerson's dictum that consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, Don't give advice unless someone insists. Instead, be fully present, listen deeply, and ask the kind of questions that give the other a chance to express more of his or her own truth, whatever it may be. If you find yourself receiving unwanted advice from someone close to you, Smile and ask politely if you can pay a little less this month. That article was written by Parker J. Palmer. Palmer is a teacher, author, and founder and senior partner emeritus of the Center for Courage and Renewal. His many books include Healing: The Heart of Democracy, Let Your Life Speak, On the Brink of Everything. He's also a contributor to the book Anchored in the Current: Discovering Howard Thurman as Educator, Activist, Guide, and Prophet. And that, my friends, has been the biggest thing I learned in 2022. How to companion with others. How to be a witness to others instead of— sorry, a witness of others rather than a witness to others. See, I'm still learning it. Oh my sense of humor late at night when I am recording these podcasts because I have to be up at work early the next morning. Well, thank you for listening to Voices in My Head again this year. I hope you've enjoyed it. I hope you'll enjoy the guests in the coming days. Still working to do podcasts weekly, often with guests, sometimes not, sometimes times like this. But I want to wish you a very Merry Christmas as we are still in the 12 Days of Christmas right now. I also want to wish you a very happy new year. Thank you so much for listening to Voices in My Head.

Thank you for joining me here this week on Voices in My Head. I hope you'll visit me on my website at rickleejames.com where you can find out more about me, get my music on vinyl and CD, follow my blog, and even schedule me for a concert or speaking engagement. Better yet, even a book signing in your neighborhood. You can find all that and more at RickLeeJames.com. Also, it would mean a great deal to me if you could write a review of this podcast on iTunes. The more positive reviews that we receive, the more visible this podcast will be online. And now for the benediction. May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. God bless you, and thank you for listening to Voices in My Head.