What will you remember about Oprah as she ends her 24-year run on TV? What
memories will people carry of her and the show?
Will it be similar to how I feel watching old Seinfeld episodes? I instantly enter the familiar world of the show's premise (did it have a premise?) and characters, and good memories and feelings of fun or warmth take over. Oldies are ours to savor, and Oprah will have hundreds. She created endless possibilities. Hooray for reruns.
There is also a deeper level behind rerun-watching. At the surface is fun or warmth. Underneath is identity and what your life is, or was, about. When I watch a Seinfeld rerun, I sometimes go underneath it and remember with whom I shared the joy and silliness of this show. I remember two people for Seinfeld, and the memories of the sharing are more lasting and powerful than the show itself.
One person who joyfully shared Seinfeld with me was my son Dave. He was/is a Kramer fan, and turned me on to the greatness of this character. Kramer had a Groucho Marx archetypal zaniness that brought unpredictability, and often electricity, to the scenes and stories. Dave just wanted to share that fun with me as father/son, and we bonded over Kramer. Kramer, in a funny way, is now a symbol of the fun we share together. And before Seinfeld, Dave's older brother and I bonded over the Swedish Chef on the Muppets. We will still break into a Swedish hum − "Der-r-r Her-r-rder Him-dah" − of meaningless sounds to make the other one laugh.
I also shared Seinfeld with my former partner, Jack, a man 20 years my senior, who became my partner in our leadership development business. As an executive in the biggest manufacturing facility in my city, he is known as the best president the company ever had. The Seinfeld-sharing with Jack was about his quirky, ever-present sense of humor, the one that made him a beloved CEO who could make the tough calls of business and who always did it with grace. The same off-beat sense of humor Jack shared with the writers of Seinfeld was closely affiliated with his original views of leadership. His was a wisdom and a sense of fun that made him a great leader. How grateful I am that I participated in Jack's deeper life, of which Seinfeld was a symbolic part.
This depth level of remembering is in all our memories, if we care to go there.
This depth of being − the symbolic life, Jung liked to call it − is what I choose to write about in The Power of your Past. And it is why I so disagree with those who are indifferent to, or even denigrate, remembering as inferior to the now or the future.
There is indeed a kind of transformational remembering that we can use to propel our personal growth. Oprah knows this. She is an icon who carries symbolic (archetypal, to use the Jung term) energy. That is why she ran on TV so successfully for over two decades, and why millions will miss her. She will be remembered for who she is, who we were, and who we were connected to, as we viewed her.
