Some Call Me Quirky

Some people call me quirky.  At first I didn’t know if this was a good thing or a severe professional liability.  I would look at some of my successful colleagues who could fit in anywhere and try to emulate them.  But then I would say or do something out of the ordinary.  Everyone else would be saying very safe things or even being silent and I would burst out with, “So, why isn’t anyone saying what they really feel?”  It was as if some wild spirit inside of me was clamoring for truthful expression, and even to this day it feels like I can’t suppress it.

     Maybe it is because I wasn’t supervised much as a child and I was free to roam the hillsides and even risk death through my childish antics.  There was the time I was riding my horse and was almost decapitated when I rode underneath the nearly invisible clothesline.   Perhaps I didn’t get properly socialized with all the do’s and don’ts of how to properly behave in carefully monitored corporate  meetings, but instead spent all my free time growing up being able to roam hillsides with no fences to corral me in. 

     Then there were the years of suffering with the outhouse at the one room schoolhouse we rural children had to go to for our public education.  Before entering, I would take in a huge gulp of air, get my business done as quick as I could, and come running out gasping.  Maybe my spirit is still running and gulping for fresh air.  For me, truthful communication is like fresh air because it provides circulation for letting go of the old and letting in the new.

     To this day, I can sense stale air in a room of civil and well-mannered people if they are feeling one thing and expressing another.  I can see the strain in people’s faces and a mechanical dreariness in their interactions resulting from stifling communication.  When civility suppresses the real and necessary message, Shakespeare might have said,

“Civility is nothing but a phony nobility that creates stagnant ponds where problems fester.” Over time, I have realized that problem-solving does not begin until people start being truthful about what they mean, what they feel, and what they want.

     For me, there are important approaches in communicating truthfully to avoid the temptation to bludgeon others with self-righteous bluntness posing as a noble quest for honesty.  For instance, before delivering the message, I ask myself these questions, “What am I improving by speaking about what is really going on for me at this time?”  “Am I being constructive?”

     Another approach is to create a reward system for honest feedback.  I invite people to give me feedback and then thank them for revealing what is really going on, so that truth-telling becomes a safe and normal part of collaboration and problem solving.  I find that even in fear-driven organizations that often shoot their messengers, it is even more important to create a pocket of associations where real communication about real needs gets to thrive.  

    In order to distinguish truth-telling from going on the attack or complaining, I try to deliver communication in an educational and informative tone, like a weather report.  It may also mean only giving one morsel of the truth.  Just enough to get problem-solving started, and waiting on the rest for better timing. 

    If holding out for honesty is considered odd or unusual, I’ve decided that I’ll take quirky any day.  For me, truth-telling is compelling because it is so uncommon and yet so badly needed.  As Winston Churchill once observed, “Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing happened.’  Even so, it takes honest communication about real issues to move a situation forward.  As Pearl Buck said, "Truth is exciting. Speak it, then. Life is dull without it."

©Gina Rae Hendrickson mediates business disputes and teaches negotiation and mediation courses at UCSB Extension. She can be reached at 805-962-2069 or ginarae@ginarae.com