My mom was all about the profound questions of life, the big ones. She'd look deeply into my six-year-old eyes that looked just like hers and ask, “why are you here?” and she meant “why are you here, on earth, at this time--as in, what are you going to do with this gift called your life?” Of course, as I grew into a high schooler, I found those questions annoying, too hard to answer, and irrelevant to the fast pace of my everyday life. Why was she always asking me all those weird questions? Why didn’t she just ask me how my day was like everyone else’s (normal) mom?
But she wasn’t normal; she was a bold change agent and anti-racist, anti-oppression activist in organizations, before that was present in corporate life and thinking. She had to get to her purpose (she called it her ‘kernel’ in her book, The Nibble Theory) early, because her life was short. My mom’s first cancer diagnosis was at the age of 49; I was 15. She died four years later at the age of 53. This year, as of my 54th birthday, I have outlived her.
Kaleel (my mom) lived a life of purpose, and I often wonder if it was because she insisted on the important questions--the seemingly too big, irrelevant to the moment, not-in-the-mood-for-them-now questions. Why am I here?
You and I, we’ll be missing rituals this season--seeing family and friends and celebrating holidays and special times in the light of people we love and whose presence lifts us up and reminds us of the vital meaning we have knit into our lives. I miss the way my dad always smells like woodsmoke and kindness, how my sister instinctively throws her arm out in front of me before we cross the street. We won’t see one of our sons, and his girlfriend who is carrying our first grandchild--a girl whom I already love and miss. I’m sad about it--and I’m mad too. Tired of this pandemic. Instead of moping around in resentment of the loss, which has been my holiday plan up until now, perhaps it’s a good moment to slow down and ask the big questions:
Why are you here?
How are you making the world better with the gift of this lifetime?
Where can you live more fully into your gifts, your talents, and the opportunities you’ve had that allow you to influence change for the better?
Where can you love more fully, show your appreciation, follow your heart?
Where or how can you show up to this life with intent and purpose?
I ask these questions, and more, of executive leaders every day. Yet, I am realizing I haven’t asked them carefully enough, nor have I answered them in some time.
I’ll share my answers in the next few weeks on our Corey Jamison Consulting LinkedIn page, and I invite you to do the same. We can learn a lot from each other, and from the big questions.
It may be difficult, but it sure beats being mad for six weeks!
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Corey Jamison brings more than 30 years of experience partnering with executives and teams around the globe to drive dramatic, sustainable organizational transformation. She has worked with leaders at all levels of some of the largest brands, and offers a level of experience, acumen, partnership and courage that inspires leaders and teams toward the hard work of taking it to the next level.