My weekly process of sharing my thoughts and experiences lulled me into thinking that I had attained a level of mastery in self-analysis and self-reflection.  Then, my big boss invited the division to participate in the yearly professional development day.  Those who accepted the invitation received a book to read.  The author recorded and analyzed several decades of survey results of her former students.  Reading their stories and comparing their experiences to mine was supposed to guide me through the process of writing my own life story.  Instead of gleaning a deeper understanding about my life, I began to fret over the length of the book, the length of the chapters, and the fact that I had homework associated with the book.

My blog has always been about telling my story with transparency and reflective thought with an end goal of encouraging, enlightening, and educating my audiences.  At times as I sat in the shadows supporting my village, I wondered how the little girl with big stage dancer dreams found herself working the stage crew.  I wondered which decision started the cycle of shadow dwelling for me.  What made me perfect for the role of a shadow dweller? Was it just one decision or me capitalizing on a number of opportunities to rehearse the role of a shadow dweller?  During my reflective moments, I asked myself what made me stay the course?  Did I believe that I was solely responsible for the circumstances of the villagers? Did I care so much that I wanted to do everything in my power to fix the issues or the people?  Did the expressions of my lyrical shadow dwelling performances inspire more of the same?  I started to wonder if the repetition provided a rhythmic groove that became the theme song I embraced.  Did I love the song so much that I just couldn’t change the track or was I simply afraid to deal with the moment when the song stopped?

I have been making my way through the book and the process for about a month.  Initially, the struggle for me was seeing myself as a member of the author’s audience.  I struggled to understand why I was spending my time reading about how to do the very things I did every day in my job.  Moreover, I already thought I was pretty good at coaching students through life challenges and into a realm in which they confidently listen to and use their “outside voices” to communicate their personal truths.  My resistance made finishing the book and the homework more difficult.  Although I knew what the writer said had some application in the lives of people under the age of thirty, I got caught up in dissecting the examples and analogies in the text.  In my opinion, the author made everything more confusing.  I found myself skipping chapters to get to the part of the book that related to me and developing my life story.

I turned to one of the latter chapters in the book in which the author summarized the journeys of several of her former students.  The journeys of a few of the former students resonated with me.  Then, my thoughts about the role of the book in my life changed.  Soon, I started considering the author’s suggested questions and my responses to the same.  The questions made me think about the people and the things that influenced my journey.  Working through the process helped me understand that it was important to consider the reasons that I made decisions in my past and equally important that I remain mindful about how the current challenges and life changes influence my decisions now.  During the process, I gave much thought to the people in my life who the author referred to as “partners.”  Recently, I wrote about adopting mentors at every part of my journey.  The “partners” were not necessarily the same as mentors.  I took time this week to consider who partnered with me at various stages of my life.  I also considered the positive and negative influences of the “partners.”  At this point in my life, I am careful about who I involve in the details of my life, my decisions, and my thoughts.

I have always considered myself a life learner and this act of resistance and rebellion made me aware of how easy it can be to stifle learning and growth.  The next few days will be spent taking a historical look at my journey.  I don’t plan to engage in a lot of second guessing and hypothetical outcomes that take me down the path of what life might have been if I had made a different decision at any point along the way.  I plan to continue to own the things I hold dear.  I will think in a more detailed way about how I meld my personal beliefs with my voice and mission to educate, enlighten, and empower others.  This process is teaching me the importance of defining the relationships in my life more clearly.  I will distinguish the people I consider mentors from those I consider “partners.” I want others to engage in the process of discovering self and listening to self with the benefit of supportive “partners.”  As I work through this process next week, I will journal and hopefully have insights worth sharing.