“Do you ever get tired of telling your story?”
As we begin our week in Arizona, I was reminded of this great question from a group we spoke to last year.
The young woman told me she was studying to be a teacher and she worried she’d become bored covering the same subject matter year after year.
“You must have repeated this presentation many times, but you seem so passionate about it. How do you do that?”
It’s a great question. And she’s right—I never get tired of telling this story of hope.
As a teacher I believed it wasn’t my job to teach math. My job was to teach kids. And since the kids changed every year, there really was no same-old-same-old. I used similar lessons, with incremental improvements, many times, but they were always different because different people were involved.
That’s how I see every opportunity to talk about hope and overcoming adversity. It’s never about the Powerpoint slides and relating the same tired stories. That would indeed become very boring very quickly.
Instead it’s about the people who are kind enough to invite us and those who show up and listen. It’s about meeting interesting folks, hearing their stories, and seeking some connection that’ll make the interaction meaningful. Like everything that really matters, in the end it’s about relationships.
For me, the hardest part of these speaking events is the one-and-done nature of our contacts. I leave each of these events thinking about the special people we just met and wondering what happens next. I wish we had ways to maintain and deepen the connections. A few folks will read the books or follow the blog, but it’s not the same.
We need to work on that.
Please leave a comment here.
It’s amazing how telling a story that different people hear it differently each time. Each individual looks at a mountain from different perspectives, backgrounds, lifestyles, etc. I always say when faced with a mountain you have four choices. You either go around the right side, if that isn’t possible, you try goin around the left side, if that isn’t possible, you climb over it. If that isn’t possible, then you just have to bulldoze through. Defeat it with the Lord at your side all the way. Hope your ride in Arizona is fun and fabulous. I look forward to meeting you in person someday. I feel like we have met before somewhere, your friend in Estes Park. Pete
You’re right, Pete. The same mountain looks very different depending on the experience each person brings to it.