This holiday season we are bidding farewell to 2020, and welcoming 2021 with a series we are calling The Conversation. A collection of brief, but meaningful insights and reflections, curated and shared by members of the Domain7 Team, centring on themes that help us reflect on a tumultuous year and move forward into the future. We are exploring change, resilience, community, transformation, and grounded hope. Today’s host is Shawn Neumann, CEO, and founder at Domain7. Just a note that we are, like many of you, working largely from home, and that these recordings may have a homemade flavour. We hope you enjoy joining us in our work and neighbourhood environments for a little audio visit. Here’s Shawn.
Shawn:
Hello and happy holidays. Today as 2020 nears a close, I can’t help, but think of this year as a series of storms. These successive storms have reshaped my landscape and likely yours as well. Personally, organizationally, socially, the well-known paths and landmarks I relied on for work and life have moved. The tried and true guide maps I once used to navigate will need to be recycled along with all my family holiday gift wrapping. I have no choice but to change. Yet, I wonder, what should I still hold on to? In light of this, I was reminded of a passage I read from Stanley Hauerwas of Duke University, and I quote, “The way things are never stays the same. So the problem isn’t how to account for change, but how to remain constant in a world of change. To be constant, to be a person others can trust, requires the ability to change.” To paraphrase John Henry Newman, it’s important to change often while remaining true to what makes you truthful.
Shawn:
This short paragraph exposes the paradox of being constant while embracing change, and the impact this may have on ourselves and others. I feel this paradox is worth reflecting in light of how 2020 has impacted all of us. Looking back at the year, I can appreciate how our individual willingness to change has had the potential to build trust, and connect us to one another. When I’ve seen family, friends or colleagues around me embrace change in response to the injustices or suffering of others, my trust in them grows. This demonstrated willingness to change has been inspiring to me. And it’s given me hope for the future. As we accumulate change after change over time, like a journey following a compass bearing on a map, we have the chance to create something new and lasting. Hauerwas describes this as shaping us into something that’s constant to others. Something that others can count on.
Shawn:
I know 2020 has been a year where I’ve needed people I can count on in the midst of change. I’ve been immensely thankful for that gift from others. Hauerwas finishes his thought by saying it’s important to change often while remaining true to what makes you truthful. That line really struck me, and the sentence didn’t end as I expected. Remaining true to what makes you truthful. As I’ve let that thought sit with me, I keep asking myself, what are the things that allow me to see reality as it is, and then respond to it in a vulnerable, authentic, and honest way?
Shawn:
By asking what makes me truthful, I ask if I’m becoming a person that can be counted on. Am I becoming a more trusted colleague, leader, friend, family member? As I look back at 2020, I’m thankful for the people who were the landmarks for me in the storm of the year. My wife and kids, my friends and colleagues, I’m thankful for the people that lived truthfully. Those that saw the reality of the pandemic, of racism, of tribalism, of personal and social financial upheaval, and have embraced the painful changes that these challenges required.
Shawn:
In light of this, I’ll submit to questions you may want to consider. First, who have been the landmark people for you in 2020? Who has modelled change and constant truthfulness for you? Do they know how much that’s meant to you? And second, in what ways can you embrace change to become a trustworthy constant for others? How might you be a helpful landmark for others in 2020 and beyond? I invite you to join me in these questions. How can we all embrace change, and remain true to what makes us truthful? I’m Shawn Neumann with Domain7, thanks for listening.
Veronica:
Shawn read an excerpt by Stanley Hauerwas from his book, The Character of Virtue, published in 2018 by William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. The Conversation is a special edition of Domain7’s podcast Change Is In the Making. Our audio producer is Kurt Wilkinson, and our designer is Ryan Martinez. Music provided by James Boraas, leadership and editorial support provided by Sarah Butterworth, Kevan Gilbert, and myself, Veronica Collins. Please tune in each week day for the first half of December to hear more from our team on moving from 2020 into 2021 with hope and purpose, or visit us at domain7.com for more ideas, resources and podcasts. Happy holidays.
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