Push yourself back to the present to be open to those unpredictable moments when someone reveals their truth.
We've been trained well by Oprah and then by the relentless revelations on "reality" TV to be audience to people speaking their Big Truth. Releasing life's big-ticket secrets about money, sexuality, infidelity, identity requires the Big "Reveal."
But in reality, as opposed to reality TV, there is no Big Reveal, no stage, no audience, no klieg lights, no Oprah, alas. There are only the rest of us, mere mortals, grading papers, searching for a paperclip, dashing from one place to the next, losing our cell phones, racing to put more money in the meter, squeezing cantaloupes in the produce aisle, about to enter the bathroom stall to pee (finally!), just trying to get from a to b....when a stranger, student, child, colleague, reveals something. Something important.
There, in that moment of distraction or self absorption and utter unreadiness, comes The Reveal; ready or not.
When you're a parent it happens all the time. One of my favorite writers ever, Anna Quindlen, wrote in her column, "With Babies On Board" about how being in the car always prompted Life's Big Questions from her children. And who among us hasn't described how the sperm meets the egg while trying to parallel park. (You're parallel parking, not the sperm meeting the egg.)
It is during just those graceless moments of being rushed or distracted or simply driving to the grocery story with the list in your head, when your kid tells you something utterly crucial about who they are; or asks about baby making or maybe asks who YOU are. Maybe it's a friend who chooses to whisper something off-handedly while the kids are playing nearby. Maybe it's a student who stays after class to mention something about a suicidal friend. It's THOSE moments that count. It is those moments that should stop you dead in your tracks and force you to push beyond whatever is in your way back into the present. Time as you know it grinds to a halt and you must now rise to the privilege of bearing witness.
Are you ready?
