JW: Resilience and asking for help

San Francisco

I've long carried the belief that I am resilient, that I will bounce back from any trial. And to a large extent, that has been true. I survived the slow dissolution of my first marriage (even though I was in complete denial until the day it ended.) I made my way through college with minimal help, found jobs easily, survived bankruptcy and the years of dealing with cancer and then death of my husband. All, basically without help, believing I could do it all myself.

I spent too many years moving up the ladder in the financial management world, earned an MBA after years of swearing I wasn't going to get one. And, after Richard died, I went on with my life, traveled, discovered a world of art that thrilled me, and experienced life in a foreign culture. I wore resilience as a badge of honor ... or a hair shirt.

Recently, however, my view of resilience has shifted since returning to Santa Barbara and spending more time with my friend Anita. I've always been in awe of how she approaches the world and her accomplishments, which are impressive ... political work in the Clinton administration, numerous awards, public speaking, PhD from Fielding, and now completion of an award-winning young adult historical fiction trilogy.

What I've unraveled in our long conversations is a puzzling background ... a childhood where she was considered a non-reader and not-smart. Dyslexia apparently, but how and why did she succeed at almost everything she tried and why did she try so many things that weren't obvious within her skill set?

The first glimmer I got was when she went to her first writer's conference. By this time, I had published several books and was comfortable wearing the "writer" designation. Anita, non-reader, beginning writer, submitted an opening sentence to the Santa Barbara Writer's Conference contest ... and won! Over the next few years, I watched her win more awards and continue to do something that challenged her far more than the average beginning writer (most of whom are avid readers). Writing for me is easy; for her it is a challenge to be mastered.

I began to wonder why she was winning so many awards when I had won none; why she seemed to succeed at anything she did. Slowly, I realized that she focuses on what she wants and then finds ways around the barriers she faces. I think she learned that there will always be barriers early so she learned how to master subjects by asking questions and organizing the materials into a body of information she felt confident with. She learned how to ask for help. Asking for help was a behavior that always seemed to be part of the mix.

This understanding began to play into the question of resilience and I realized that Anita displays resilience ... she has learned how to dance on thin ice while I've stayed on the shore playing it safe, some place where I don't have to ask for help.

If resilience is recovering quickly from difficulties, doesn't that mean you have to truly try something difficult and fail before you can say you recovered?

If I've ever displayed resilience it is in relationship to writing and art. I wanted to be a writer as a child and all through my early adult years, I submitted queries and proposals with a solid rejection response. To avoid the rejection cycle, I started doing my own newsletter which led to my first book contract. That was resilient and persistent. It also involved asking for help as I convinced my employer to buy a desk top publishing system so I could make a newsletter, presumably for the company, although that never happened.

A similar thing happened with art. I tried almost all media and took dozens of classes (many with Dolores) and was absolutely terrible at all of them. Then, after Richard died, I went to Mexico for a digital collage class and magic happened. I spent a week with a teacher, asking for and receiving help every day. Suddenly, I could say the word artist without apologizing.

Bottomline: I think there's a formula here ... keep following something that's calling to me ... and ask for help. I think what's calling is finding a way to put images and words together in a way that expresses myself and serves "the world" ... even if it is a small boon for a small world. Something that also scratches my curiosity ... new places, new stories, new wonders.

Taking a lesson from Anita would mean identifying the barriers to following this calling, figuring out a strategy to deal with them ... and asking for help.

Maybe the bigger question for me is why it's so hard to ask for help.