The beauty of humanity resides in its diversity. I am convinced. We are all different and that is wonderful! And yet, having moved through a few organizations over the past two years I find that there are typologies of people who are found everywhere. It made me wonder: are we more alike than different? Is this what common humanity means?
As I took a year off from schools, I briefly worked with four other organizations. In my work of two decades in one international school I connected with tens of people from other such institutions around the world. Back in the world of international schools, where I belong, I am once again intrigued about the fact that there seem to be “types” of behaviors around me that I have seen in almost all the other institutions, regardless of the fact that they are thousands of kilometeres and mentalities apart.
Haven’t we all had to put up with the one that only seems to have our best interest at heart, openly welcomes us and helps for a while, only to bite deeply and painfully at the first chance they get? Aren’t we all working with someone who loves to find the people who hate the same people and gossip their head off each time they get? Or how about the one flying under the radar, coming in late and leaving early, hoping nobody notices? And the one who apologises every single second and does not hear a word that you say because they are too busy trying to make things right? Haven’t we all been each of these at some point in our professional lives?
Writing about this it dawns on me that most probably these are adaptative behaviors that we enact to survive, in the realities that exist in our lives at one moment or another, in periods of our lives where things are harder or easier to move forward or to even swallow.
I love Dr. Brene Brown and her work has been uplifting. And there is one thing she says that makes me so very mad because the truth of it cannot be shaken: she invites us to do this exercise, ask ourselves this question – how would you react to the person in front of you, what would you think about them and their actions if you were told by THE authority you believe in without question that this person is doing the very best they can with what they have in this particular moment?
In my experience, there is no reality more frustrating and none more prone to getting us to connect and empathize than this one. And when we empathize, feel with the other, we understand that in fact, there is no other. It is just us and our common humanity.
Photo by Michał Parzuchowski on Unsplash
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