Perhaps because of the media focus this week on the January 6th Capitol riot, I woke up the other day with a short fable planted in my head – one that’s been written in one form or another a zillion times. A small village finds itself plunged into darkness. In the village square, people are walking about, unable to see each other clearly. They start to bump into one another, causing accidents, arguments and misunderstandings.
Then one villager has an idea and lights a candle to see better. A number of other villagers notice, and light candles of their own – allowing them to walk about freely, offering assistance without contributing to the chaos.
Not everyone, however, catches on. Some villagers — for whatever reasons — never light a candle, and continue to fumble in the darkness. But rather than avoid such people, the candle carriers encircle them – the glow of their combined light helping to reduce the darkness for everyone.
I think of people who know how to engage others in constructive dialogue around contentious issues as candle carriers. What most distinguishes them is that they share their light — their goodwill — without strings, without preconditions. They know there’s no litmus test for who’s worthy of the candle’s light.
I meet a lot of candle carriers through my workshop, and I’m incredibly grateful for them. Linda (not her real name) is one. She contacted me several weeks ago for advice. She’d been through my workshop and wondered if I’d coach her on a conflict she was having with her niece. I’m not a therapist, but I agreed to talk to her to see if any experience in my life could help her think through her own situation.
With Linda’s permission, I thought I’d share our correspondence because to me it highlights what it means to be a candle carrier. You might also find aspects relevant to your own difficult conversations.
Without going into details, the gist of the conflict is that Linda’s niece had done something that hurt Linda’s feelings and, wanting an apology, Linda confronted her about it. But rather than apologize, Linda’s niece went on the attack, saying she had nothing to apologize for, and in fact if anyone needed to apologize, it was Linda. The niece also vaguely referred to a number of other things Linda had done in the past that the niece was still angry about, adding yet more complexity to the dynamic.
The anger and intensity of her niece's response caught Linda off guard. That’s when she reached out to me. Specifically, she wanted to know how the principles of my workshop could be applied in a situatIon like this.
My first suggestion was that, before reaching out to her niece, she take the time to understand her own contribution to the conflict. I reminded her of the second “new survival drive” we discussed in my workshop: “See beyond your story.” We all look at the world through the lens of our past, and hurt feelings in the present almost always connect back to earlier life experiences. By making that connection conscious, the intensity of our emotions diminishes and we’re able to take responsibility for our reaction rather than blame it on others. No longer trapped in our own story, we’re able to see more clearly. That’s when we stop being part of the problem and start being part of the solution.
It was not easy advice — but as a candle carrier, Linda took it to heart. Days later she sent me this email:
Thank you for taking the time to meet with me last week. Although it was difficult, I was able to honestly (I hope) examine how my story caused me to react to my niece in a way that began an unfortunate chain of interactions. What became apparent is that my story is my humanness.
I love that line: “My story is my humanness.” Ain’t that the truth! There’s a release of self in that line, an acceptance of our humanity that’s as freeing as it is humbling. I think a lot of the pain and suffering in life comes from unrealistic expectations of ourselves. When we can let go of those illusory expectations we can stop resisting our own humanity, tapping into a well of compassion for ourselves as well as others.
Having reflected on her own part in the conflict, Linda decided to draft an email to her niece and reached out to me again for my thoughts:
I'm wondering what you think about addressing some of the points, actually accusations, she brought up in her response to me. On one hand doing so seems like it might muddy the already treacherous waters, yet on the other hand, failing to acknowledge anything she wrote seems like a disrespectful dismissal. I don't know which route to go, and, if I decide to address some of what she said, how to do so without "defending" myself and continuing a back and forth argument. One of her accusations is partially true. I could own the part that's true and say something about the part that's not.
At any rate, I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts.
Here’s how I responded:
I don’t know the specifics of this situation, just the outlines, so my comments will be general, based on my own experience. I offer it knowing you’ll decide what feels relevant or appropriate to you.
Given what you’ve said about your niece, I’m guessing a “rational” conversation about who’s responsible for what is presently off the table. She’s not ready. She’s still in a highly emotional and reactive state.
Given that, I recommend removing yourself from the equation. Release any need to be understood, for things to be fair, to have your point of view expressed. In the language of my workshop, those are all the desires of our “story self.” It wants to be acknowledged. What I call our “un-story self” — that deeper, intensely grounded sense of self we experience when we are “self-abandoned” — has no need of that acknowledgment. Tap into that. Trust that.
Then have one goal: Imagine you’re a crisis interventionist. Your job is to help someone who’s in a troubled state of mind get into a healthier state. It’s not personal to you. You’re free to say/do whatever is needed to help your niece.
As a crisis interventionist you know the first step is to acknowledge that her feelings are legitimate. Not legitimate in the sense that you’re somehow responsible for them, but legitimate in the sense that they’re the natural outcome of her own present state of being — her own story.
So give her that acknowledgment, and then give her a reason to trust you. Something to the effect that, “The last thing I’d want is to have you feel the way you do. I love you, our relationship has always been special to me, and anything I've done to hurt you I’m sorry for. I hope you can forgive me.”
If that last sentence trips you up, let me clarify: The spirit in which you ask for forgiveness has nothing to do with taking on blame; it’s not a statement of needing forgiveness for yourself. You ask for forgiveness out of an awareness that this is what the relationship needs to move forward, and because you know that by forgiving you for her perceived trespasses, your niece is taking an important step in her own healing. The act of forgiving is primarily for the benefit of the forgiver, not the forgiven. By forgiving you, she is removing her own obstacles to the relationship. Obstacles she put in place.
More advice that’s not easy to take, but Linda said she found it “instructive and helpful,” and that she’d use it as a guide in writing her email to her niece. She chose to send the email on December 16th, in honor of South Africa’s Day of Reconciliation.
In our last communication Linda shared that she’d not yet heard back from her niece. But she wasn’t ready to give up. “I’ll wait a few months and then try again,” she said.
Sometimes that’s just the best we can do. To be patient, to leave the door open. Because you never know when the other person might walk through.
In the meantime, Linda has the increased self-awareness and peace of mind that comes from having done the work of candle-carrying. She’s glad she did that work. She’s glad she sent the email. Because, she said, “living with personal/emotional courage is important to me.”
In this time of relative darkness, it’s important to all of us.