Songbird

She says the song was hard to write, to play, even to listen to.  She didn’t think she’d ever play it live.  Yet she sits down at her piano without a band or a chorus of vocals behind her, naked of an elaborate set, dramatic lighting and any costume, and she pours the rawest of lyrics into the world in the most achingly tender and beautiful performance.  It’s hard to believe Taylor Swift didn’t write the ballad “Soon You’ll Get Better” for this moment when it so perfectly captures what we all can’t help but be afraid of in this moment.

We were speechless when she struck the last key on the piano, looking into the camera with such heartfelt relief and humility.  While nearly everyone who performed that evening showed incredible courage to put themselves out there absent of their crutches and accoutrements, we know hers is the performance we’ll remember because she was the only one who chose to share such an intensely personal song; her own original song.

The recent weeks have been hard, no doubt. Staying at home seems like such a small sacrifice, especially when my paycheck continues to hit the bank, uninterrupted.  We joke about the yeoman’s job we’re doing here at home saving lives. And in the same breath I feel awkward and uncertain all the time. 

Yes, I’m equipped to work from home and have been doing so for years, but what’s changed is the work I’m doing.  I’m leading leaders who are now balancing home schooling, childcare and work, or wrestling with their spouses and grown children for “the desk”, or going to the garage to sit in their cars to make phone calls. None of our clients are operating in the same manner we’re used to. They’re making unprecedented demands of us to keep their own ships afloat, leaving us with no choice but to make hard calls about relationships when the money stops flowing.  We’re learning who our real partners are; this situation magnifies what we’ve always known in our hearts to be true about who we walk with in lockstep and with whom we disagree fundamentally at the core. 

I’m passionate not just about doing business. I’m passionate about doing good business. Who aligns with our vision, and mission and values?  Who wants to buy what we have to sell?  Not everyone, and that’s okay.  But it’s hard to be the one to say it's time to cut the cord.

I think back to my own divorce, and how I finally found the courage to ask for it.  It wasn’t about anger or bitterness or regret.  Sure, those feelings presented themselves, but they weren’t the real story.  The real story was we just weren’t a fit.  We valued different things, we had our own individual visions that didn’t converge, we couldn’t find joy in each other’s paths, we fundamentally disagreed.

My coach calls it a “growth hangover”, when we spend a disproportionate amount of time out of our comfort zone.  There is no doubt that as we all stay home to flatten the pandemic curve, most of us are battling this metaphorical hangover:  The fuzzy head, the desire to curl up in a ball and sleep all day, maybe even feeling a little bit like throwing up.  What’s really scary is how many of us need tender loving care right now, a remedy for this hangover that has stretched on for 35 days, by my count.  How can we flatten the curve of upheaval staying at home has ignited?

I think the answer is in Taylor Swift’s stirring performance.  Yes, she said she didn’t think she’d ever play that song live. Yet she did because she believes music isn’t always about pleasant feelings.  Amid the uncertainty, isolation, and sadness there is this awesome opportunity for growth if we are vulnerable and courageous enough to sing our own song. We’re all being called to reinvent ourselves in some way, shape or form.  This is a reckoning we cannot ignore, the time to get clear about who we are and who we want to be for the world when we find ourselves able to walk out of the dim bar and into the blinding light of a sunny afternoon.

As I struggle with the hard calls I’m being asked to make during this time, never have I been more attuned to and cleaved to the calling I hear to live my values, to defend my truth. I start crying when he points out I already am. I am Taylor Swift, he says, singing a beautiful song.