In support of a pregnant friend with a struggling man

 I recently received an email from a lover of years past. She is now pregnant and with a man who is very unclear whether he wants to be a father and whom she describes as often angry, distant and reserved. He emphasizes freedom in his spiritual growth and is thus resisting being a father with all the responsibilities that entails. This woman reached out to me asking me for advice. I share my response below:

Good morning [name],

That sounds like a difficult situation to be in. A few things may help -

1. Men's group: He is in a situation which is very difficult to work through without other men, and with time pressure. I strongly encourage he find or start a men's group that meets regularly. It should focus on good men's group things like integrity, facing his fears, taking responsibility for his actions and his life, finding his life purpose and actually walking it, and so on. If this doesn't work out, finding a really good life coach or therapist may help - anyone he can confide in that will both hear him and hold him to a high standard.

2. Choosing from freedom: Freedom for some people can mean, "I have no obligations and nobody expects anything from me". This ultimately is very isolating and not very satisfying, but with this perspective, any obligation/expectation is a burden, a diminishment of freedom. And of course, parenthood with little external support and unsure relationship with baby-mama has a lot of obligations/expectations! Another, deeper sense of freedom is this: "I commit to living the most meaningful life imaginable, to being who I am alive to be. I recognize in my heart I am meant to be a father, and I accept that this pregnancy is a gift in helping me be who I alive to be - a father. This is a challenge to be grateful for." In other words, he must not think of this as a burden or something forced on him, but something that is part of his sacred path, which if you're right that he wants to be a father, it is.

3. Acknowledging fears: If you're right that he really wants to be a father, then the reason he's not excited is because he's scared. The first and hardest step is always to face the fears. Example fears: How will he have to rearrange his life? Will he know how to handle difficult situations with you or the kid? What will he have to give up that might be important to him? What dreams did he have of fatherhood that this doesn't quite match up to? Can he handle a responsibility that lasts the rest of his life, not just a year or two like a job? Will he treat his child the way his parents treated him, or will he do better? Can he afford to take care of the kid and take care of you?

He might not even be able to articulate these fears to himself. The more you can get him to articulate these fears, the better. Once they're out in the open, you can acknowledge your faith in him and simply work through things. Until the fears come out, they remain difficult for you to help with.

4. Bravery and trust: Many men learn not to face their fears, which is exactly what needs to happen in this situation. Again, a good men's group can be extremely helpful. In this situation, it is important for him to find the bravery to face his fears. There are many ways for him to do that. One thing that inspires bravery in men is women's trust. To hear you say "I trust you" or "I have faith in you, I know you can do anything" as you look into his eyes, this is powerful. Of course, you have to find that trustable, brave part of him as you speak so that your words are true. But of course you trust him, or else why would you try to keep him around as the child's father?

A simple mantra which may help him is this: "I can handle anything". Just him saying this over and over may help, and hearing you say it about him may help too, so long as you mean it.

5. You must have faith: This last one is for you. Faith means to trust that the best thing that can happen will happen. If he's meant to be this child's father, he will find it in his heart to show up. if not, he will leave, and that will be the best thing. If you feel afraid and try to pressure and manipulate him, it will do no good, even if he ends up staying a little while before leaving. Build him up, help him be a deeper man, remind him you're in this with him together, and you can do it. If he refuses, keep doing your best - open in spite of his closure, as we used to say together. And ultimately, if he keeps refusing, prepare to take care of yourself and the child without him and be a model of strength and resourcefulness of your child. Find family supporters, find other women friends, do whatever you need to do. I know you can do it, if you need to!

Remember that your choice of father is one of your first gifts to your child. I can tell how much you want this man to be the baby's father. I hope it works out and he finds his true strength. But if not, there are other men, and there are many fathers so bad that it would have been better not to have a father at all. So again, do your best and have faith.

I wish you well! I hope you will let me know how it goes.

Stigmatizing people with labels of mental health disorders

A number of people have recently become upset with me. I have not heard all the details yet, but it seems related to my recent decision not to work with someone who lied to me and made excuses when I confronted them about it. An informal conversation recently took place between a few dozen people, and I was not there. Some people complained that I am an intense person and sometimes do not notice other peoples' emotions, and a friend diagnosed me with neuro-divergence. She later told me what she said. I wrote the following in response, lightly edited for this blog post. 

I want to respond to your comment about neuro-divergence. We didn’t call it neuro-divergence when you had low self-esteem for much of your life and became very insecure when that social storm happened to you a few years ago, nor when Andrew lied to me then misrepresented my response  to a crowd of other people. We don’t label people with integrity-deficit-disorder or confidence-deficit-disorder.

What behavior people diagnose with a mental health disorder is basically arbitrary. In some cases it may help shed light on some pattern based on chemical toxin exposure, nutrient deficiency, or something else, but mostly it’s a way of stigmatizing certain emotional patterns while tolerating others. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses, and giving people official-sounding medical labels for their weaknesses is unhelpful and dehumanizing. As I like to say - let the person with no emotional issues whatsoever assign the first label.

A major implication of such diagnoses is that the mental/emotional problem is not simply a pattern that can be grown out of, but something inherent and either unhealable or can be healed/covered up only with drugs. For example, when someone gets the label autistic, most people will just lower their expectations for that person rather than help them grow. Once I get labeled neuro-divergent, who would pull me aside to help me see things I don’t? Why help someone if "that’s just how he is"? But I have learned to tune in much better over the years. Why not just say "That's a weakness of Whip's which I've seen him working on"?

Or take the example of depression - I have read repeatedly that one observed pattern is that depressed people are commonly less willing to pretend to believe the lies of the culture around them, and less willing to maintain unfounded optimism than most. No wonder they’re depressed! Better put them on anti-depressants. Many of these people could be great sources of positive change if helped to channel their gifts for the greater good. Instead I believe America drugs its latent spiritual leaders into submission. I believe many heavily diagnosed and drugged Americans simply have gifts that their society does not welcome. Instead of adjusting our unhealthy society, we drug and stigmatize our children into sameness. I don't believe we actually know what a fully emotionally healthy person is even like! Most people have never met one.

So, thanks for telling me what you said. I am still deeply grateful for the stands you took in my defense. And, I do not support that diagnosis and I do not consider it constructive. I ask you to find other ways to help people relate to me and to each other. 

Equity, Integrity, and Solidarity

I work for a nonprofit and recently chose not to work with someone again after he lied to me and refused to commit to being honest in the future. Many people disagree with my stance, and at least some of them do not understand it. I wrote the following to clarify what happened and where I stand.

If someone asked me to summarize all the different equity issues around the world in a single word, I would say ‘solidarity’, with a root word of ‘solid’.

Solidarity - women ask men, “please stand in solidarity with us, recognize our problems are your problems because at root we are one”. Black people ask white people - "Please stand in solidarity with us. Recognize our problems are your problems. If you have privilege, use it in solidarity. Because at root we are one."

It's the same everywhere - rich and poor, adults and children, humans and nonhumans. Solidarity is what’s needed, and what’s missing.

*Solidarity, solidness and integrity* What is needed for solidarity? Every activist ever will tell you solidarity requires solid relationships based on trust; we have to be able to trust each other. And that means we have to tell the truth, we have to keep our promises. Otherwise we will not be solid with each other, and we cannot stand in solidarity, and all our hopes and dreams of being good allies and doing equity work will be for naught.

Since closing circle of Rivercane 2023, I have been involved with staff and leadership in three cases of low integrity. In two cases, a group intended to break a promise or outright state something false when they knew the truth. In the third case, the staff member Andrew did outright knowingly state falsehoods to me.

*Dishonesty poisons relationships* Everybody knows that dishonesty and breaking promises destroys relationships. Your wife, your husband or partner - if they lie, that is hard to come back from. Same with coworkers and friends - if they break promises, it severely limits the relationship. Low integrity is absolutely poisonous to any relationship and any culture. But that doesn’t mean when a person does something wrong I cast them away. Instead I seek to hold others to a high bar, just like I’d want others to hold me to a high bar when I slip. And that’s what I did.

*Holding each other to a high bar* In each case I held the person or group to a high bar and said, to summarize, "we’re better than this. you’re better than this. Let’s find a way to be in integrity, to tell the truth and keep our promises even if people become upset with us because of the stand we’re taking. We can't let fear of others' reactions keep us from doing the right thing."

In the first two low-integrity cases, the group heard me and changed their path. they ended up keeping their promise and telling the truth. It was simple.

With Andrew, I entered a meeting with him and the coordinator Sara with the intention that he would work with us this fall and I would resume trusting him. My first question asked him what exactly he remembered happening last spring between us, and he agreed: at the end of the spring event, he had the correct mileage numbers and knowingly gave me wrong numbers to change the worktraders’ reimbursement amounts.

*I want to trust you and for that I need you to return to integrity* I told him I wanted to trust every word he says, and for that I would need him to ‘return to integrity’, which is a simple process:

1. Acknowledge what you did and why it wasn’t ok. For example (he didn't say this; it's what I would have wanted to hear): "I deliberately told you wrong information to manipulate reimbursements for worktraders. I see how you wouldn’t trust me after this and I know how important that trust is to you and to me too."
   
   
2. Acknowledge what was going on for you that you chose to lie (show some self-reflection). For example (again, not something he said), "I was afraid you wouldn’t listen and I wanted to give a better rate to the worktraders. I should have trusted you to hear me out, but even if I didn’t trust you or if we disagreed I should have been honest so we can acknowledge any disagreements and always be clear with each other."
   
   
3. Commit to integrity. For example: "I apologize for lying. I commit to always telling the truth and being straight with you. Thank you for hearing me out and recognizing I can come back from my mistake."

The meeting with Andrew could have been 3 minutes long if he had just said this. I spelled out this return-to-integrity procedure very clearly for Andrew repeatedly. What did I hear instead?

Excuses:

• I was busy
• Actually Madison told me the idea
• I was going to tell you the real numbers later
• I don’t regret what I did.
• I don’t consider what I did dishonest because I planned to tell you the real numbers later but I never got a chance.
• I hear how in your experience you might perceive dishonesty, but really that’s just your experience and not my experience because I know I was going to tell the real numbers later.

The nonprofit's head coordinator Sara was there with Andrew and me; she can vouch for all this. After going round in circles for an hour, and hearing the excuses mount, and hearing we have very different understandings of honesty, I drew a line. Andrew would not commit to a path that would let me trust every word he says, and so I would not work with him this fall.

While I acknowledge getting exasperated a few times, I recall remaining very self-controlled, speaking clearly and respectfully the entire time. I practice being direct, clear, and firm on issues like this while also listening carefully and remaining humble and open to feedback. In this case I entered the meeting well prepared with what I wanted to happen to resume trust. Instead of a commitment to integrity I got excuses. Instead of acknowledgement I got shifting definitions of honesty. I would be dishonoring the organization if I handed a budget to someone with a track record of lying to my face and making excuses when confronted with it.

The way I see it, I stood for a culture of integrity, and Andrew voted himself out. It’s not a question of forgiveness. I welcome him back whenever he’s willing to return to integrity.

*We get what we stand for* I believe we get the culture we are willing to stand for. I want to be around people I trust and who trust me. People who hold each other to a high bar so we can do big things in the world together. So long as we tolerate working with people who don’t agree on what ‘honesty’ even means, we will never be solid enough to be in solidarity with others. Without being solid, without integrity, we can spend thousands of hours talking about equity but it will come to nothing and no one will feel better. Thus, I focus on integrity as foundational to equity work. I commit to holding others and myself to a high bar, to being solid, so we can be in solidarity with other people and the earth.

*equity work: I focus on solidarity first, then feelings* Many people seem to approach equity work with the goal of making people feel better. I think this is backwards. Feelings of deep comfort and safety come not from focusing on people's feelings, but by standing in solidarity together, even when we really really don't feel like it. It comes from standing for shared values, shared norms of appropriate behavior. I might have an argument with someone, but I'll feel just fine if I know deep down they'll have my back in any emergency; they'll stand with me if someone behaves disrespectfully towards me.

So long as we focus on making people feel good while tolerating low integrity, I do not believe anyone will ever feel deeply good. The profound shift will come when we agree on shared norms and stand for them no matter what, together. This requires solidarity, which requires solid relationships based on integrity. That's why I'm taking a stand for integrity.