Lifeletter #174: Two Women, Two Worlds

I arrived at the gate for my flight back home from San Francisco last Sunday. As I stood there, I noticed a woman in a nearby seat, meditating. She had a lovely look, and her energy felt grounded and full of peace. She looked like someone I might know.

About twenty minutes later, when we were lining up to board the plane, she approached me and said, “Don’t I know you?” I told her I was thinking the same thing. I felt warmth and genuine friendliness in the space between us. I asked her what she did. She replied, “I teach Qi-Gong.” “Ah, I said, “ I love Qi-Gong.”

She smiled, “So do I.” We continued to chat as the line inched its way forward. She asked me what I did, still trying to get a sense of where she might have seen me before. I noticed that she was truly interested in me; I felt heard and seen by her. I told her I was in California for a training connected with my work.  “Me too,” she said, “I love to learn more and more about Qi-Gong.”

I asked her if she had a website. “Yes,” she said, “but Qi-Gong is not well known, so I do not have a big following.” She smiled in a beautiful and interesting way, touching me with her integrity and humility. It was clear that she did not need a lot of people to follow her; she was following something deep inside herself, a strong current of love and dedication. As we were getting on the plane, she turned around and gave me her card. I took good care of that card-it was a sweet and potent thread that had joined us together, and I wanted to honour our connection.

On the plane I sat beside a woman who works for the New Yorker magazine. Being with her was like stepping into another world. She was about the same age as the woman I had just met, running on a very different energy. It was as if she was plugged into a completely different socket.

She was eager to tell me all about the New Yorker, which she sold advertising for. I learned a lot of very interesting things about the magazine and the writers; and I didn’t feel any connection between us. Her way of talking was like a big out-breath, with very little receptivity. I asked her how the CEO of the New Yorker was, and she proceeded to tell me all about his remarkable intelligence. “I’m wondering what kind of  environment he has created for all of you?” I asked her. “What’s the culture of your workplace like?”

When I asked her this, her face changed; it got darker. “It’s very intense, in my department,” she said. “Because you have quotas to meet each month, and there is a lot of pressure and competition?” I asked. She nodded. “Some people just can’t take it.”

“But you can, and you are good at it?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said, “I am good at it. I’ve been doing it for a long time; and I am so tired of it.”

I felt a lot of sadness in her, at that moment, without knowing if she felt it too. Sadness and exhaustion. I could feel the weight of the lifestyle she and her family had become accustomed to, supported by her salary and her husband’s income.

I said to her, quite softly, “This is what we call in the coaching world, the trap of excellence. I’ve been here myself. Just because you are very good at something, doesn’t mean you are supposed to keep doing it.”

She looked at me without saying a word, and then we landed.

 

When someone knocks on the door,
Think that he’s about
To give you something large: tell you you’re forgiven,
Or that it’s not necessary to work all the time,
Or that it’s been decided that if you lie down no one will die.

Robert Bly
(Morning Poems)

 

with love,

Shayla