The Miracle of Light – Helping the Struggling Person Come Back
It always amazes me in the best way to see someone go through a low point and go back to being the positive person they once were. It is as if the light that once shone within them has returned, as they are no longer confused by fear and are free to be happy and, most importantly, free to be themselves.
To illustrate, there’s a guy I know, Andy, who apparently went through one of these dark periods about a year ago. Catching up with him in the elevator at work one day, he was suddenly a different person; antagonistic, negative towards the company and, worse still, negative towards our people: it was not characteristic of him to be like that. I couldn’t understand it. Later, weeks later, he was at a meeting that normal Andy was attending, but he wasn’t there. He grumbled about a couple of things and you could feel the tension – there was an elephant in the room! I asked a couple of people who knew Andy well what was wrong and found out that he had lost one of his parents. He was grieving. That explained everything.
Andy’s world had been turned upside down, and emotions that never seemed to be an issue before randomly surfaced and caught him off guard. What was he going to do? Well, in this situation I did nothing other than give him a lot of what I call “grace space”, which is just being nice and kind and not someone who would cause him even more grievance. Most of the people I saw interact with Andy treated him this way as well.
It also made me think about these moments from my past. There was a time or two in my past when grief came over me and feelings of depression washed over me; my demeanor was haggard and not much fun to be around. The people he liked the most didn’t say much. They just listened. I find it ironic that I’m not really a natural listener in this sense; I prefer to talk and cheer. It is a reminder that sometimes words are often not enough.
These days, Andy is a different man: not only has he regained his own enthusiasm, but he’s filled with another level of enthusiasm that’s just contagious to others. He is a leader in the workplace, very knowledgeable and one of the most courteous guys he has ever met. He has such a high value of respect. It is great to see the miracle of the Light work in this man.
When it’s hard to get along with people, it’s hard to understand or be able to help, but we can…
We need to encourage it and not push the person back by calling attention to it. road they behaved during the dark time; if we did this, we should expect them to only be “dark” with us: the person who remembers them that road. If we see the person slipping back into dark attitudes, we should be able to give them time and space (“grace space”) and tacitly encourage that the world isn’t so bad, so they ooze respect and build trust.
© Steve J. Wickham, 2008. All rights reserved worldwide.