As it happens, this is the 50th post. I hesitate to call it the formal/accurate “newsletter,” because there’s so little “news” in this slow-motion stream of consciousness, but hey, whatever it is, it’s the 50th. That’s if you don’t count the first couple of (now classic) posts such as, “Coming soon,” and, “Is this thing on?” And my favorite, “Testing something.”
Some of my best work, honestly.
Coincidentally, the nice round number of this post heralds a slight change in direction for Rise Above (Today). It’s been a (solitary, introspective, reflective) wild ride since I went all-in back in August, but, as I’ve mentioned before, I don’t want this to be all about me. There’s only so much well to tap here, and at some point, one has to move beyond diagnosing and reflecting on the problems and, you know, actually doing something about them.
“Hey - did you know there’s a hole in the boat?”
“Yeah - I’ve been meaning to blog about it.”
Fortunately, the fixes are well underway. Remember that proposal I made for my day job? No? Okay, well, in short, I identified an opportunity for an educational project, wrote up an extremely wordy proposal, and sent it up the idea chain. I looked at it as a direct challenge to myself - putting big ideas out there in a big organization merely six months into my tenure there. It forced me to face some fears, to confront the smirking, sarcastic beast called “Imposter Syndrome,” and to go against the flow.
Against all expectations, something happened with it. I got a message from a VP of marketing who loves the idea and is already putting feelers out there to see if it’s a project they want to take on. Then he sent an email introduction to the organization’s Director of Communications. This is a pretty huge deal. There’s still maybe a 5% chance that it’ll go anywhere, but that’s up from 0% when it was just an idea in my head.
At home, my wife and I, who have been having a fairly civil Civil War (though it was definitely not civil at times), have been arguing at a much higher level. Now it’s more like the begrudging civility of a presidential debate or a UN General Assembly meeting than a street brawl. This is progress. Lol.
(But seriously, we’ve been working things out in a truly grace-filled way. I hesitate to even talk about it for privacy’s sake, but also for fear of jinxing things. Let’s just say miracles are happening.)
There’s a lot more work to do, and new crises have arisen, but this is the battle. I’m ready.
What is “Rise Above?”
Back to that slightly new direction…
I’m getting a little uneasy about the “guru-ness” of this thing. I’m no guru, but I’m clearly regurgitating a lot of the content I “consume” from that space. And that space is filled with…let’s just say “elements” that I think produce the opposite of the intended results. As our great-grandfathers might have said, doing life well doesn’t depend on “revealing” any secrets or “one weird tricks.” It’s pretty basic. Perhaps it might be summed up as, “Don’t be an idiot.”
Great Grampa was a character…
So, what I’m getting at is that I want to hear the stories of other men (primarily) who have “risen above.” In fact, I settled on a mission for the ‘Stack: “To highlight stories of men who have crashed and rebuilt their lives better than before; to give hope to men who think all hope is lost.”
“Rise above” is a phrase that I’d been invoking in my head for a long time before I was aware of it. At some point, I’d recognized that I would let the challenges of the day overwhelm me. If they were big, I’d despair. If they were small, and I’d inflate them with toxic breath. After many years, though, I started to catch on to what I was doing, and I’d stop and think, “Hold on - what’s really happening here?”
That’s when I began to realize the possibility of, and necessity to, stop, evaluate, and name problems, and then transcend them by, at the very least, not giving in to the eruption of emotional responses. I began to learn how to rise above the challenge - or terror - of the moment.
When I realized one could “rise above,” and do it today, not “tomorrow” or “someday,” I realized anything was possible. “Rise Above” means liberation.
So what’s your story?
If you have such a story, I want to hear it and share it. It can be as public or anonymous as you’d like. If you’d like to share, just click the link to the form below and answer these questions:
What was the “challenge?” (Loss of job or business, failed or failing marriage, death in the family…)
What was your lowest point, and what were you thinking while there?
What specific, concrete steps did you take to “rise above?”
What was the turning point toward the better situation?
What did you learn? What is life like now?
I’m sure I’ll tweak this “questionnaire” in the future, but for now I think that gets to the heart of it. You can tell your story here. I’ll edit it for length, clarity, etc.
Who knows? Maybe this is dumb, but I honestly do want to hear inspiring stories from other people.
Sound like a plan? Thanks for reading!
Rise Above is a reader-supported publication, project, and now, a personal mission to inspire people through stories of triumph over chaos. You can help with that mission by upgrading to a free plan below.
If that’s not in the cards, please consider sharing:
Also - let’s hear from you!
Sounds like a great project.