No Mediocre Contact!

For 18 years I had the pleasure and honor of having Mae as my best friend and teacher. She was a wise and remarkable soul in the body of a white cat with a black, heart-shaped patch.

She passed away last June, and I miss her every damn day. But part of me thinks she moved on because she felt she had done a good job raising me, and I was ready to be on my own. 

Mae taught me about love, commitment, and sweetness. She taught me about the importance of being curious, saying yes to adventure, and sometimes being fierce. 

One such lesson came over ten years ago. My then boyfriend and I hosted a dinner party at our house. A couple of people came who were decidedly more his fiends than mine. One of them was a guy I couldn’t stand because he managed his insecurities by acting like an overly confident attention hog.

As we hung out around the living room before dinner, Mae was perched on the back of the couch, a part of the scene. The guy I didn’t like got right in her face. “Oh my gawsh,” he gushed in the tone used with babies and animals. “Aren’t you so CUTE?!”

He doesn’t see her I thought to myself. He just wants attention.

For about twenty seconds he distractedly patted Mae as he held court with the room—until she quickly turned her head and bit him, hard, on the hand. 

In the 18 years I knew her, I can count on one hand the times she lashed out at a human, and it was always warranted.

The lesson I learned from Mae in that moment?Do not put up with mediocre contact! 

If you’re going to engage with me, engage with me. If you want to connect with me, take the time to see me.

I’m not advocating biting people. But, I am asking, why would you settle for not being considered?

And let me say, I was settling for a LOT of mediocre connection in my world at that time, both personally and professionally. I knew I wanted better; I just didn’t know how to get there. 

All these years later, having become, well, more the person Mae was teaching me to be, I know I’m not the only one who has tried to get by on relational crumbs because I didn’t know how to get a full meal.

And this pisses me off. So much—too much—of our relational life is defended, disconnected, pre-engineered and unfulfilling. We are taught the wrong set of rules and build the wrong set of skills for attaining fulfillment in our lives and relationships. 

This brings me to what I love about the work I do: I get to see all of someone. They don’t hide what they think won’t be acceptable.

And, it works. When people show up fully, they start feeling more in tune with themself and stop feeling so thrashed around by the difference between their insides and their outsides.

I want this for the world—people who’s insides match their outsides being parents and leaders and spouses and friends. 

My mission is to give people the blueprint and skills necessary to embody the conviction, competence and courage to create fulfilling relationships with themselves and others.

Want your insides to match your outsides? Yours Truly is for you.