Welcoming Feedback as a Gift: The Joys of Fresh Bear Poop and a Throne Room a Hike Away!

A friend and Client, Steve Smith, Plant Manager at CPNPP, said, “If you don’t welcome feedback as a gift, maybe that’s because you don’t get very much feedback. And maybe that’s because you choose to think of it as criticism and take it personally.”

I thought this was very perceptive of him to see it as a system, one piece influencing the other.  He went on to say, “We can’t grow as fast or as effectively without honest feedback.  So, even when it may be hard to hear, it’s really a gift.  Someone cares enough to help us know where and how we can do better or improve. 

Recently my husband, Larry and I went on vacation escaping from the 100+ degree days in Dallas to the cool mountain air of Colorado.  My son and I had rented a remote cabin at 11,000 feet just outside Telluride.  It was in a scenic area away from tourist in a high alpine meadow.  We thought we had the perfect answer for an extended family of eight, several of whom loved to backpack and cap in the remote wilderness and a few who preferred the comforts of a warm bed and kitchen rather than a bedroll, campfire, and tent. 

The cabin was a beautiful log cabin with pot belly stoves and great views.  But there was no electricity, only solar lights and an outhouse you had to hike to.  This meant that in the middle of the night if you got a biological urge, you had to either find a flashlight and wonder out where fresh bear poop had been spotted and hope to not bump into something hungry.  Or you could use a “Honey bucket” and empty it the next by logs --- for four hours of stirring a huge tub of mossy green spring water!  Well there was a great view and lots of wild flowers….and large mountain mosquitoes!

The first night it was dark as pitch at 8:30pm and I heard the familiar voice of my beloved provide some feedback which I didn’t receive as a gift.  “Ann, is this your idea of a bad joke?”  I confess that at that moment I was so focused on my intent, which was to find a creative solution to please each family member, that I heard his feedback not as a gift but as unfair criticism.  Then I began to reflect on the skills we teach in conflict resolution.  The first is Active Listening, which sounds like this.  “So, the accommodations here fall way short of your expectations and you are horrified about being stranded in such a primitive situation for five days.  Am I hearing you right?” 

I could sense him letting go of some of his anger as he realized that I understood how frustrated he was with me and the whole situation.  Next I worked to establish mutual goals.  “We both want quality time with our children and grandchildren, we want to relax and be in a situation where everyone has something to enjoy and we want to be good sports even in a less than perfect situation.  Would you agree?”  It took sleeping on it to get this far.  But by the next morning he had shifted from: “I’m out of here on Monday“, to considering staying the whole five days. 

The gift of his feedback was to help me realize that my assumptions of thinking I could judge what would please each person were seriously flawed.  And even though I thought I had shared all the information from on line, in truth I probably described it over dinner when he was not fully tuned in.  So maybe we both owned some of the problem yet I needed to stay focused on what I could take away as a valuable lessons learned.  And that is that I am challenged to welcome all feedback as a gift.  I still easily fall into my victim mode, choosing to feel unappreciated and hurt.  Attitude is a choice and I am the one who loses the most when I fall back into old, negative habits.  This awareness is a profound gift.  And only the courage to recognize my patterns and make better choices will transform my future.

A TRUE STORY OF PROBLEMS BECOMING OPPORTUNITIES: Stones into Schools

Several Saturdays ago, my husband, Larry, and I went to hear Greg Mortenson, the mountaineer who wrote Three Cups of Team and Stones in Schools.  Greg told his story of losing his way in the mountains and being rescued by his Sherpa and a remote village in the Himalayas.  And then promising to find a way to build a school for the girls of this remote village.

Over the past 16 years, Greg has learned of the healing power of female literacy.  "When you teach a boy, you educate an individual.  When you teach a girl, you educate a community."  Not only do girls go home and teach their mothers, they also go on to become teachers, doctors, attorneys, and engineers.

We learn that the population explosion is linked to female literacy.  As women are educated, infant mortality decreased significantly.  And as women can be confident that their children will live past age 5, they choose to have fewer children (from 7 or 8 to 2.3 per woman).

Not only can we address the complex problems of women dying in child birth, infant mortality and controlling world population.  Another fascinating link is to jihad and suicide bombers.  In the Muslim culture a son must get the blessing of his mother before doing jihad.  Rarely will and educated mother give her permission because she knows the Koran forbids murder and suicide.  It seems that the Taliban depends on illiteracy to control the minds of the people.  And as schools are being built in the most remote areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan, the Taliban is finding it more and more difficult to recruit followers.

This is an engaging story of servant leadership, working through trust, teamwork, and local leaders.  The village donates the land and the labor to build each school.  Central Asia Institute (CAI), the non-profit founded by Greg Mortenson, then funds the resources.

It is very encouraging to learn that Three Cups of Team, Mortenson's first book, is now required reading for all US military heading for Iraq or Afghanistan.  Learning and respecting the culture, earning trust, and working with local people has become the new strategy to establish a sustainable peace in this region.  "Drink one cup of team and we are strangers, two and we are friends, three and we are family."

Again and again, as the stories are told, each problem becomes a surprising opportunity.  Greg tells how a child in the elementary school where his mother was the principal, offered all in hi piggy bank to help the children in Afghanistan.  And from that, now 400+ schools now participate.  Pennies for Peace is a program to introduce children to the opportunity to become a philanthropist on behalf of others.

I strongly recommend these book as a fascinating way to learn about the history and complex cultures of this region as well as a very practical true story as t why servant leadership is such an effective form of leadership.  These books will inspire you, delight you, and fill your heart with hope that together we can replace war with lasting peace.