It's been a tough month so far around here, and I haven't had a whole lot to laugh about. My New Year's resolution to reframe things more positively has, in short, had a rather tough workout. I am seriously wondering how quickly we can get to 2010, because so far, I'm not all that thrilled with the 2009 model.
I seem to have unwillingly dragged much of what was wrong last year into the new year with me, with the unfortunate result that I will have to continue to deal with some serious problems into the foreseeable future. That has fired off a desire within to drop whatever baggage I can to make my life slightly less stressful and more fun.
Without going into detail, I have identified the problem areas, and they are as follows:
1. Pretty much everything; and,
2. Everything else.
On the upside, that gives me a lot of latitude in deciding where to start making those attitude changes that I have been assured will change my whole life.
But seriously, I have played the "If Only" game many times in my life, and for the most part, it has been frustratingly unsatisfying, although I could never put my finger on the reasons why. Last night, for the first time, I heard it framed correctly for me, and it was interesting what an impact that made upon my own self-assessment.
I heard a man speak who has had some of the worst luck you can imagine, mixed with some of the most miraculous good luck you will ever come across. I felt like I should try to touch his hem, just so some of that good luck might rub off on me.
Of course, that would run the risk I'd get the bad luck piece of the cloth instead, and with my luck, I think we all know which way that one would go. Not to mention it would be a little awkward to explain why I'm crawling around the floor at the feet of a rocket scientist I don't even know.
I imagine it goes without saying that I resisted the impulse, although I did boldly stride over after everyone else had gone and tell him how much I enjoyed his talk. Do you think it's possible to convey good luck by osmosis? I want to be on his team when he plays the lottery, that's all I have to say.
Anyway, his name is Shant Kenderian, and if you want to know about his life story, please read his book, "1001 Nights in Iraq." His story is a fascinating combination of horrendously bad luck entwined with incredible serendipity, and in the end, he seems to feel that he is the most fortunate man in the world, which is quite a long leap from considering yourself dead, forced by Saddam to fight in a war you don't believe in, whose goals you cannot support. He is uplifting and encouraging and altogether interesting, and if you have a chance to hear him speak, you should take advantage of it. From prisoner of war to rocket scientist in 1001 complicated steps.
In his talk on his life at my church last evening, which I was fortunate enough to attend thanks to a friend that is one of my many blessings, he followed up with questions from the audience. In true child-shall-lead-them fashion, the most interesting question of the night, to me, at least, came from a young boy who was in attendance, and who asked several interesting questions. But the best one was this, "If you could go back in time, knowing what you know now, and what the outcome would be, would you still go back to Iraq when you did?"
You should know that the reason Shant went to Iraq was a compelling one for him personally, and wasn't something he did lightly or thoughtlessly. It wasn't a lark - he was trying to right a wrong that was eating away at him, and to restore a relationship in his life, with his father, that had been grievously wounded years earlier.
Still, given that he was trapped there for ten years, missing his family and home in the United States, where he had lived for most of his formative years, the answer seemed obvious. It wasn't. Shant surprised everyone in the audience, I think, when he replied, "That is a hard question, because I did the right thing. It was everyone else that did the wrong thing. So how could I go back and do anything else? Because I still did the right thing."
Wow. That is a powerful way of living your life, and to overcome regrets and despair. If you live your life knowing that you have always done the right thing (or done the best you could, which is the same thing, for all intents and purposes,) then you can let go of the negative feelings, because you had no other course.
It was inspiring, to say the least, coming from a man who has been to hell and back several times because of bad luck that was totally out of his control. This is one of the few times I have heard someone speak directly to my heart, and to reach me exactly where I am. Shant understands the frustrations and the despair of trying to do everything right, and having it all go wrong anyway, and he gave me hope, not with empty words, but with experience, that somehow, it can balance out in the end.
Our circumstances are very different, and I don't mean to equate my small problems with his, by any means. But the out of control, bad luck happens sort of situation in which he found himself spoke to me, and made me feel like here was someone, at last, who had a roadmap for life that might work for me, too. Here is a man who had the deck stacked against him, and who managed to not only get through it, but to rise above it, and have the better life he dreamed of all along.
He could have given in to the despair and the hopelessness many times, allowed it to eat him up and drain his spirit away. But instead, he stayed focused on his goal of getting back to the United States and starting his life again, and that was where his energy was placed. No wasted time on what went wrong, no regrets that he didn't do something different. First and foremost, he had his faith in God that somehow it would all balance out. And he had a sense of humor.
I don't know about you, but I waste too much time on regret, wishing that I had done things another way, or better, or just hadn't done them at all. I beat myself up over decisions that haven't worked out the way I hoped, people who have let me down unexpectedly, circumstances that have worked against me, no matter how hard I try.
My faith has been a tough struggle, as well. I attempt to make sense of how a life that I tried to live well could have gone so wrong, with no answer forthcoming. I have been cross and angry with God for letting me down, without looking to see where I am being lifted up.
The biggest loss, or perhaps the most noticeable, has been my sense of humor, especially in the last few months, as things have piled up and my nerves have become frayed. I have a hard time seeing the funny side of life right now, which is something that has buoyed me up previously. It seems to have slipped away recently, as I have faced some problems, financial in nature, that could have life changing consequences for me, and for my kids, and I don't know where to find it again. I miss being able to laugh at myself and at life generally, and listening to Shant was a breath of fresh air for me. It was a wonderful reminder that humor can be found anywhere, even in the worst of times, if only you are willing to look for it.
As I listened to Shant and watched him frame his experience for us last night, I saw a different approach, one which acknowledged the hardships, but which used humor as a perspective. Shant was never resigned to his fate, he always viewed what he wanted as possible, and it became almost a game to figure out how to get it.
Where one door closed, he looked for another one. If that failed, he looked for a window, or a hole, or a crack he could get through. He didn't allow the impossible to deter him, so ultimately, anything was possible. He didn't perceive any step as backward, progress just took different directions. He seemed to see everything as moving him forward, even when it appeared to be a setback.
That is a whole different way of looking at life, and I think that it is one I can embrace. I cannot overlook the very real problems I face, and I can't pretend there aren't serious consequences, as though that doesn't matter. But at each fork in the road of my life, I have always done the best I could, and I can't go back and change that, even with better information in hindsight. Because, in the end, I always did what I believed to be the right thing.
I can set goals, and I can reach for the possible, because I know it can happen, and I have seen the proof. I can reframe the difficulties I face with humor - I have done it before, and I can do it again. I can look forward to what will be someday, and set my eyes on the mountaintop, rather than focusing on the mountainside, where you see all the rocks and the ridges that have to be overcome.
The interesting thing I have learned about heroes is that they rarely perceive themselves that way. They don't usually see what they have done as exceptional or as special. Instead, they generally see their actions as the only possible course, or as the right thing to do. They are often surprised to hear that they have affected someone else, and they are generally modest about the role they played in the situation.
But to me, Shant is a hero, not for going to Iraq, not even for surviving the ordeal, but because he is willing to open up his life story and allow others, like me, to benefit from his hard won experiences. I don't know if Shant believes in superstitions like four leaf clovers for luck, but he did say that he thought he used up all his bad luck early, so now, he has nothing but good luck to balance out.
Shant will never know me or how he has affected my attitude or my ability to cope, but for me, hearing Shant speak last night was the best luck I've had in awhile. [And I didn't even have to touch his hem to get it, so perhaps he really can spread his good fortune by osmosis!] I hope that maybe this will be the start of some overdue balance in my own life. Maybe one of these days, I will even find my sense of humor again. When I do, you'll be the first to know, because I have a lot of stuff that I'm eager to reframe and find funny.
In the meantime, excuse me while I go touch a rabbit's foot for luck. His name is Gershwin, and he is residing in my daughter's bedroom, so I don't have to go very far to find him. And he likes to eat clover, so perhaps he's going to bring double luck for me.
