samng.me

Accompanying others

My sons,

A growing epidemic in our modern world is that of loneliness. Despite us having built an enormous amount of technologies that allow us to share our thoughts, video conference with our loved ones, engage in large social groups online, and even live stream our daily lives, we as a society are growing more lonely.

A big factor for this is that even with all these ways to connect, we have become more centered on ourselves. We seek our own fame, our own status, and our own glory. We use these mediums to further our own reputation and agenda, rarely spending the time to deeply think about others.

In that type of social climate, is it really a surprise that many of us do life alone? We have lost not only the desire to be a partner, but have lost the skills required to accompany another person on their path. We have traded true accompaniment for coexisting, for parallel pathing, for being fellow travelers with a common destination. These are not the same.

The goal of the accompanist is to enrich and enhance that which they are accompanying. In music, the accompanist exists solely to enhance the soloist and plays music that highlights the music played by the main performer. Their role is a complementary one, and highlights the collaborative nature and beauty of the musical piece. Their purpose is the celebration of another, and the accentuation of the skill and desire of another. They are wholeheartedly for someone else.

Diminishers and Illuminators

In every crowd there are people who diminish others and there are people who illuminate others. Diminishers focus on themselves and make others feel small and unseen. Illuminators have a persistent curiosity about other people and have the ability to understand others.

Diminishers are people who spend their energies trying to glorify themselves, to lift themselves up, to have everyone focus on them. They want to be seen as always right, as the star of the show. They do this both by elevating their own achievements and thoughts while diminishing others and subtly putting them down. When a Diminisher offends someone, they put the focus on why the other person shouldn’t have been offended, or on how poorly the other person reacted to being offended.

Illuminators on the other hand are much less about themselves. While they may be (and often are!) quite badass themselves, they don’t draw attention to that. Their confidence doesn’t require the approval or awe of others. They’re genuinely excited about you and your successes, and aren’t at all concerned about their own. While they are happy to share if asked, they are usually too busy asking questions and exploring their interest in you.

An example:

Benjamin Disraeli and William Gladstone, fierce political rivals, each served as Britain’s Prime Minister in the late 1800s.  During a period when both men were single, they happened to go on dates with the same young socialite on back-to-back evenings.

A short time later, a reporter asked the woman about her impressions of these two notable leaders.  She said, “During our time together, Gladstone convinced me that he was the cleverest person in England. But Disraeli made me feel like I was the cleverest person in England.”

To truly accompany someone well, we must learn to illuminate their lives and enhance their experience of their world. In order to do that, we’ve got to learn to be for someone else, to be more concerned about their goals, their dreams, and their path.

Skills of a companion

Accompanying someone, like every other activity of which we partake in this life, is a skill. It can be grown, it can be developed, it can be practiced. Some may begin life with more, some with less, but regardless of where we started, we all can learn how to better accompany others. But we’ve got to want it. Because it is unnatural (and by unnatural here, I do not mean anything sinister; I simply mean not natural), we do not develop this trait without intentionality.

So assuming we want to become better companions, how do we learn to do that? What are the traits that a companion has?

1. Patience. We must not push at our timetable. Good company allows space and time for relationship to develop. A high form of praise is someone that you would want to linger with - to hang out with after the dinner guests are gone, to shut down the restaurant with.
2. Playfulness. To deeply know and to accompany means to play. Playfulness allows us to set aside our proper selves and enjoy the vulnerable reality of one another.
3. Being other-centered. Accompanists are making great music together with those they are accompanying, but they are in the background, they are the support. To accompany someone, one must be focused on them, to allow yourself to be lost in them.
4. Presence. Accompanists are present. They show up. They are there for the other person on that person’s schedule. This means that they need to have space, to have margin, and to have bandwidth for the other.

When I was in university, I had an advisor that gave me some great advice that has lasted with me over the years. My advisor knew that part of my journey included helping others and being there to support them. However, like every other student, I needed to study, to go to class, and to sleep a ton because let’s be honest, all university students are sleep deprived. He also knew that I had always been an efficient optimizer. This meant that I would optimize for sleeping more and getting to class right as the bell hit for instance. (Anyone that knows me today will tell you that I consider it a win when I get to the airport so late that they have to call my name at the airport because the plane is about to leave).

My advisor gave me some sage advice. He said that if I was serious about impacting others, I’d have to plan to get to class 10 minutes early, that I should slow down my walking pace, and that I should double the amount of time I planned for meals and coffee breaks. “Life does not happen on your schedule, Sam” he told me. “Others will need help at the most inconvenient times for you, and if you truly want to impact them, you have to have the time and ability to put them first”.

To have one is to be one

No one wants to go through life alone. Some of us may have had heartbreak and trauma that have wounded us deeply and has caused us to be fiercely independent. We may even have deceived ourselves into believing that we prefer life alone, and that we are happy on our own. Deep down though, I believe that each of us yearns for connection, yearns to know and to be known. We each desire to have a companion for life; someone that we can rely on, can depend on.

In order to have a companion though, we ourselves must know how to be a companion. The more we are able to bring out the best in others, to illuminate their lives, and to be for them, the more we attract others who want to do the same for us.

And so my sons, my hope for you is that not only are you kind and thoughtful men, but that you are men who know and are known by your loved ones, that you have someone in your lives that desires to accompany you, but most of all that you have the skill and the care to accompany someone else and to illuminate their life. Our world is cold, dark, and lonely enough on its own - may you be light to someone’s life, and may they in turn light up yours!