courageous lawyers
Lawyer and author Stewart Levine has written this interesting piece on the conversations we need to have with ourselves and others in order to create meaningful professional and personal lives. Putting his own spin on a concept originated by poet David Whyte, Levine discusses the nature of these “Courageous Conversations.” Of the five conversations he describes, the following three resonate the most with me in my work as a solo practitioner. Here goes, in Levine’s words:
· What is the conversation you are not having with your unknown future?
Each of us is always somewhat incomplete because we tend to live, at our fullest and healthiest, in a state of becoming. When we stagnate and become rigid we are holding on for dear life, struggling to maintain the status quo – not being willing to engage the real possibilities the future holds for ourselves and others. When we posture and maintain that we have the answers and do not need any help we cut ourselves off from the many potential futures that live within, each moment becoming a death warrant.
· What is the conversation you are not having with your customers?
The service we provide to our customers exists on the very bridge we have built in the conversations. When we stop having real conversations we are not engaged in getting feedback about what we might be doing for them, finding out where they want to be headed and how we might improve what we are doing. Yet we refrain, because we’re afraid to find out the bad news and would rather believe we are doing a great job.
· What is the conversation that you are not having in your own heart and mind, with your partner and loved ones?
This is obviously the most important. If you are not having the conversations with them that are real for you then you are living an inauthentic lie. In some ways it all starts from this. If we are real with ourselves, then we can be real with everyone. And when we are brave enough to be our authentic selves with everyone than our own natural brilliance begins to shine through. From this place all else is born.
This is provocative stuff. I’m constantly reworking my approach to law through conversations with myself, clients and others in my social and business networks. Many of these conversations have taken me way outside my comfort zone and pushed me to acknowledge my failures as well as successes. But, I’ve welcomed them all because they’ve invariably spurred me to change and grow in a positive direction.
