Radical Loving Care: Journal of Sacred Work

Days 109-113 - When Water Falls

  We began life in Water's womb. Her waves, or lakes, her streams are poems. Especially when water falls. 

    The link below takes you to a brief meditation on waterfalls including a poem that I wrote & narrated in the hope it would bring some serenity to your life. 

   May you enjoy the peace that a marriage to the water can bring. 

   Click on the link below:

https://youtu.be/MJZx5eNThng

-Erie Chapman

Photograph by Erie from "When Water Falls" includes image of me with my mother.

Life's Load-Bearing Pillar - Days 30-34

 The instant we exit the womb we pursue stability. Our first test, The Apgar, checks whether we throw our arms out when a caregiver mimics dropping us. 

   Indeed, the falling test and the startle reflex are bizarre proofs that we are born with only two fears: falling (something Hitchcock used routinely) and sudden sounds.

   Babies flail for physical stability. We pursue emotional stability. The first comes naturally. The second is often elusive.

   Each search signals that life depends on finding our load-bearing pillar. Most say we need many. My central one: meaning. Without meaning there is no hope and without hope, we die. Children seek solid ground for first steps and meaning from parents.

   Oak trees symbolize my load-bearing pillar. I love their strength, deep roots, soaring branches, their ability to look human.  

   My oak starts with God who is love and light. I trust what I cannot see as solid ground.

   Why are their constant threats to our balance? Money, illness, job loss, betrayal, imprisonment, violence, ugliness. Ugliness drives me to its opposite: Beauty. Imagining myself a strong male I seek balance in my opposite: Woman. 

   When my career journey veered from the masculine combat of trial attorney (my generation) to the hospital world of caregiving, I found that the load-bearing energy was feminine. 

   Fortunately, my first caregiver was a woman. God willing, my last caregiver will be as well.

-Erie Chapman

To support Radical Loving Care^®, please click the "Donate" at www.eriechapmanfoundation.net

Photopainting: "Pillars - Back View" - Erie 2023 

 

Our Geography - Days 25-27

   Thank you for opening to an image perhaps uncomfortable. I hope that will ease as you read. 

   Great poets change us. The incomparable David Whyte writes, "The human body constitutes a live geography, as does the spirit and the identity that abides within it."

   Dressed or not, we recognize others first by their landscape. The architecture of the face. The differences between male and female. The woman's back slopping to hips widened for childbirth.

   Because I see women as Beauty's source and a shape opposite mine, I have always been drawn to her as artist as well as man. Her figure speaks Love's best creation. 

    Through art museums, academic study and a communion with dancers, I have photographed, filmed and sculpted the female form since 1975*. My work has received countless awards & been hung in galleries, museums and universities internationally. 

   Yet, it seems so inconsistent with my conventional career that many are aghast. We are less sophisticated than ancient Greeks. Portraying nudes remains dangerous.

   Sadly, women without clothes have frequently been objectified. Sadly, most people are not educated to differentiate art from pornography.

   

   Uncovering in a medical context, appropriately done when medicalized, remains difficult for women. Indeed, we must protect the sacred. 

   All of this confuses art appreciation. As Minton Sparks says, in our films Dreams of Drowning & After Drowning, "There's an implicit message that to gain power [women] have to swim in the vulnerability of their own nakedness"

   Museum goers often turn their away from Beauty's best slopes, curves and shadows towards her offspring: mountains, flowers, oceans. 

   The larger point: When we hide from respectful presentations of the female form we blind ourselves to the sacred. The problem is not the geography of nudes but Society's failure to teach appreciation of the body as Soul's home. 

   Can an we absorb Whyte's wisdom? "To live out our genius is to live out the conversation between our particular inherited body and the body of the world."

   Staying stuck is staying ignorant. "Throw the emptiness out of your arms/ to add to the spaces we breathe; maybe the birds/ will feel the expansion of air, in more intimate flight," Rilke writes. 

   Can we open our arms to broader life experiences? Can you, a weary caregiver accustomed to healing broken bodies, find greater beauty in the brilliant geography of your own and all others?

-Erie Chapman

*

https://nashvillearts.com/2018/07/the-other-side-of-erie-chapman/

"Minton's Back" Erie, 2018

"One Thing At A Time"? Days 9-13

   By the time I got down the hallway to the kitchen I had forgotten what I ran to fetch. It is not the first time. That is why I run. To maximize the chance I will remember. In this case, I am at risk for becoming distracted by the 20 photographs that adorn the walls.  

   I asked a friend how she spent her time." I misplace things," she laughed.   

   The primary reason for my forgetfulness is not age. It is the exponential growth in the volume of information older people have. Plus, I am endlessly distracted by ideas.

   Ideaphorics* are always absent-minded. Floods of ideas make everyday stuff unworthy of remembering. 

   A Buddhist monk once described the essence of Zen as "One thing at a time." Great wisdom that I consistently ignore.

   Society demands that leaders & caregivers multitask and make no mistakes! The same is true of leaders, artists & anyone else attempting to accomplish many things. One thing at a time? Impossible. 

   One practice helps: Meditation. Every time I engage this 20-minute practice it works!

   Today, I planned my twenty minutes & ran the hall to tell my wife. By then I had forgotten. 

-Erie Chapman

* Ideaphoria: "Capacity for creative thought or imagination." (Merriam-Webster)

Please support Radical Loving Care by donating a dollar to Erie Chapman Foundation via: www.eriechapmanfoundation.net. THANK YOU. 

Photo: "The Hall" Erie Chapman, '23

Careers That ADD Years - Days 1-5

  Sure. Doctors have an above average life span. Nurses? Not so much.

   But if you could crank back the clock & pick a profession that would enhance your longevity and joy (the two are linked) two careers stand out.

   The first is no surprise. Everyone knows the answer. It is nuns. Not just Catholic but Buddhist.

   The surprise comes with the other finding on longevity...a job held by folks that flap their arms around on stage & are rewarded with cascades of joyful sound. Music conductors have long topped the list of the long-lived. 

   Note Leopold Stokowski, 95, & Arturo Toscanini, 89. Important illustrations because average life expectancy in their era was 50. 

   Not surprisingly, another group of musicians is at the bottom of the longevity chart: rock musicians. Another low score went to another group of artists we call poets.

   Is the meaning of life more important than its length? It is to me. 

   Nuns & conductors win the quality/quantity quandary by achieving both.   

   Teachers have notoriously long life spans. However, it is hard to surpass caregiving when it comes to meaning of family when it comes to what matters. The selfie made by my son defines Hope for me in ten faces. It shows every member of my immediate family starting with my wife (3rd from left), son, left, & daughter, 4th from left. 

   Here is a life challenging New Year's resolution: If your work holds deep meaning stick with it...even through periods of burnout. If your work is just a job, switch to something that matters to you.

   Above all, draw neigh to family & friends. Help those you do not know. That is my recipe for a Happy New Year. 

   In the end, what matters most cannot be measured. 

Erie Chapman

 

    

   

Is Life a "Quest?" Days 346-350

   If a quest for meaning requires adventure you have been on one since you choose caregiving. Your harder stories are easier to tell than live because caregiving is peppered with challenges to quit.

   You who stayed are my heroes. What keeps you going?

   In 8th grade Mrs. Emerson handed us one of the greatest quest stories in history. The tale of Odysseus (aka Ulysses) is The Odyssey of Homer. The hero's story is so riveting it survived a three-thousand-year journey from Homer's hands through millions more before it reached mine.

   Ulysses's quested to see "new worlds." His journey's monsters are so vivid their names are woven into storytelling's fabric.

  You may know Homer's Sirens, witches whose songs & beauty were so alluring that sailors would dive overboard & swim to their deaths.

   However, Ulysses protected his sailors by blocking their ears with wax. Desperate himself to hear the magic songs but unsure of his ability to resist them he had his crew lash him to the mast & ignore any pleas he made for release. 

   Temptations, of course, are as dangerous as any gun-toting thug. Homer knew that. One of his questers was the warrior Achilles who could not be killed because his mother had dipped him into the river Styx whose waters would protect him. But she had held her baby by the heel thus leaving that spot vulnerable.

   Think of that next time that tendon of yours hurts.

   How many Siren songs have entered your ears? How many discovered your Achilles heel & tried to take advantage?

   Tell me neither has happened & I will tell you your life has been a rest not a quest. 

    Tennyson's poem, Ulysses, ends with my mantra: "To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." 

-Erie Chapman

Painting, "Ulysses and the Sirens" John Waterhouse, 1891

Can We Go Home Again? Days 318-322

   In Act III of Thornton Wilder's, "Our Town," Emily, deceased during childbirth, speaks to her fellow spirits, begs to return to  one day in her life & is warned against it. 

   "But it's a thing I must know for myself. I'll choose a happy day, anyway." Her wish is granted.

   You & I share Emily's hope in other ways. We seek return to best days & know we cannot. We can do something impossible before: enjoy both today and those days through reflection & reunions (e.g., RMH Facebook Page.)

   I do that often. 

   June 30, 1983. I parked on a hill & stared down at the campus I would lead in 12 hours. Riverside Methodist was the largest hospital in Ohio. 8000 caregivers, including 1500 doctors, attended to thousands. 

   Thirty-nine, I was humbled & thrilled. If I took care of the people who took care of people those caregivers would have better lives.  

   June 30, 1995. Exactly 12 years later, I walked out the door for the last time as CEO of RMH & OhioHealth, thrilled by huge changes & heartbroken it was over.  Other fine opportunities awaited but RMH was the longest & best. 

   To which of my 4,380 days at RMH would I return? Most, but not all. 

   Jovial Tom Van Papingham from maintenance wore OSU suspenders every day. I took him to a game. Arriving just before kickoff there was Tom wearing a giant smile & those OSU suspenders.

   "Any trouble parking?" I asked. 

   "Nope. Got here two hours ago," he chuckled.

   "Wow. How many games have you attended?"

    "This is my first! Isn't it great?" he said. 

   OSU lost that day but Tom won. He may not have been a nurse, doctor or therapist but Tom helped our leaders understand that everyone was a caregiver. No maintenance, no hospital. 

   A million moments prove that "small" times anchor reveries. Amazingly, staff still thank me for showing up: to congratulate them on a new baby,  thank them for their hard work, work a half-shift beside them in uniform in every area from laundry to nursing, thank (the late) Marcy Alton for world class employee recognition events. 

   Our leadership team enabled home runs like Hospice at Riverside (Tracy Wimberly), McConnell Heart (Jeff Kaplan), Elizabeth Blackwell Women's center (Tracy), new day care center & (in photo) on-campus grocery store (Mark Evans & Carole Stanley), & much more.

   Metrics endorsed our culture as patient/employee satisfaction soared above the 90th percentile for ten straight years with parallel results in quality & finance. Our strength gave me the base to found OhioHealth. 

   On national television n 1994 ABC News' Forest Sawyer declared we had lifted Riverside to "One of the top 10 hospitals in America."

   David Whyte teaches us Emily's trick: "Memory is not just a then, recalled in a now, the past is never just the past...memory is...a then continually becoming other thens...creating a continual but almost untouchable now."

   Yes. We can go home again. 

-Erie Chapman

Photo posted on Facebook by Colleen Timko

P.S. I Googled Tom and could not find him.

   

The Audition - Days 312-316

   Invited to photograph dancers at an audition, I found myself judging the performers even though I was not the casting director.

    As each hopeful awaited their music cue some looked nervous. Auditions suggest judging & judging raises that awful specter called Rejection. If we were always our best selves, no practice would be needed. If we truly trusted our God within it would be nice, but not necessary, to have others' approval. 

   Auditioning is innate. Does not an infant begin "performing" the moment they discover behaviors that serve them? Smiling done for approval signals that auditioning has begun. 

   Every job I wanted required an audition before I was "cast." Dating is an audition process. Think of the tryouts you went through to become a professional caregiver? To live successfully in society we routinely pursue one thing: acceptance. Approval from others of our okay-ness.

   Early in my hospital leadership I visited a doctor who had become a patient. He was lying in bed wearing scrubs. 

   "Hey, I don't want to look like a patient," he told me with a chuckle.

   The doctor was auditioning because he knew what we know: A patient gown is demeaning. Maybe his doctor costume would protect him.

   It was an early signal that what patients & caregivers need from leaders is an environment where both were honored. What an uphill campaign! 

   We are told, "You don't need to 'perform.' I care for you as you are." 

   But life is flooded with judgments. Depression's onset in the late 1990s taught that gloominess is off-putting. I had to pretend "normal" or find myself alone. 

   Naturally, discernment & evaluation are necessary disciplines. What I love about the God of my understanding is that Love is patient, kind & forgiving. Does realizing that mean I can stop auditioning?

-Erie Chapman

Photograph: "The Audition" Erie Chapman, 2022   

Carving "Immortality" - Days 305-309

 At 9 (2 years younger than snapshot) I picked up my pocket knife and headed out to immortalize myself. Elyria's Black River fell over a cliff behind my grandparents house. I walked down to a spot where it rushed past towering red oaks & around a limestone bolder. 

  The world populations was two billion. The bolder offered eternal distinction. It would be hard work to make my mark with a jack knife but a small price for permanence. 

  Two hours later, there it was: "Chip 1952." My blade & I were too worn down to write my last name. But I had left enough evidence for archeologists to discover, memorialize & rope off for public view Erie Degrasse "Chip" Chapman, III's ancient carving. 

   My child's eyes had not drunk in the warning in Ecclesiastes, "Vanity of vanities. All is vanity." By the time I did read it I was already life-deep in the romantic search for the golden chalice &, ridiculously, have not stopped.  

   How could I know that only God's love is eternal. Romance is a season. Our markings fade. 

   Every cemetery offers literal proof of Ego's success in nudging even the most humble to etch stone. Analogies abound. They teach us what every Thanksgiving tries to reinforce. That gratitude for what we have now matters more than striving for what might be. 

   Shortly before before passing, my dear dad typed his autobiography. Since no resume captured how we loved him & he lacked Twain's gifts, his four children, sadly, ignored it. With rare exceptions, autobiographies please writers more than readers who wisely give themselves the chance to savor, gratefully, their recollections.

   Two & a half thousand years ago Pericles warned us, “What you leave behind is not...engraved in stone...woven into the lives of others.”    

   Is not it fortunate that Love cares nothing for our names but only hopes we help others?  

   The world now struggles to support 8 billion. Every caregiver helps thousands. Too many others suffer & die alone. 

   Legacies live better in stories than on stone. One winter before World War I, dad almost drowned riding ice cakes down the same Black River on whose banks I sat carving forty years later. Like George Bailey in "It's a Wonderful Life" my dad helped others by living love; through the YMCA, his family & thousands who never knew his name but are better because he survived that icy river. 

-Erie Chapman

Snapshot - Chip at 11 by Dad

Loving the Afterglow - Days 298-302

   Sunset and retirement share a legacy: Both have an afterglow. 

   Note Dorothea Lange's observation,  "The camera is an instrument that helps us see without a camera."As a lifelong photographer (photographer means "light writer") I have always practiced this including making so many images of sunsets it is amazing my eyes still work. 

   Those who think this way attend more to afterglows than to moments the sun's crown vanishes. Once again, the sun nurturing path teaches: Our careers offer one way to shine our best gifts on others.

   "Weather" stalks every career. Some let clouds shade their entire work lives. They spend countless moments checking the hours until "quitting time?" Later, the same folks start counting the years until retirement.

   One of the mainstays of Radical Loving Care® is that any work, must be seen as a calling. Repetition & fatigue cloud that.

   God calls with a whisper not a shout. Listen & watch the breeze part those clouds. 

   As for retirement's afterglow, people like me always preach what we are trying to practice. Am I still chasing the sun when nighttime is nigh?

   Some reasons I never say, "I'm retired." The working marginalize the non-working. I continue multiple careers: film art, philanthropy & mentoring. I am not done. 

   The difference from my 40+ "sunshine years" of salaried work is scheduling freedom. But this is a mixed blessing for. Try saying, "I used to be a nurse."

   Yet, which light is more gorgeous, "Midday or sunset?" Gradually, I have come to love the afterglow. 

-Erie Chapman

Photograph: Erie Chapman: "Sunset Florida 2016"  

How You Got Your Achilles' Heel - Days 291-295

   A few months after wonderful Rhonda Swanson became Executive Assistant to me as President & CEO of Baptist Hospital System she asked a challenging question: "I love working for you because you are a strong, inspiring & kind-hearted leader." Then she hesitated.  

   "What is it?" I asked, bracing for a complaint. However, Rhonda's tone was inquiring not accusatory. 

   "You are so good at teaching loving care why do you sometimes get so impatient?"

   It was & is a great question. I have spent a lifetime trying to figure out & solve this problem.

   Consider an ancient myth whose star's name occupies everyday language. Most talk of having an "Achilles' Heel" without knowing the origin. Learning it aids understanding of Radical Loving Care^®. 

   When a baby, Achilles mother (Thetis) went to bathe him in the River Styx whose waters gave lifelong immunity. As she lowered him toward the rushing current she realized she must hold onto a part of him. She picked his heel. 

   Ten years into the Trojan War, hero Achilles got cocky about his invincibility. When Paris, discovered his enemy's vulnerable spot he shot an arrow into it killing Achilles.

   Irritability signals my Achilles Heel: unintentional but occasional Arrogance.  Admitting it is the first step & I do. Oddly, I mess up the second step & turn shame on myself !  Self-loathing never heals. 

   The better choice is continuous cultivation of Arrogance's enemy. Humility nurtures Understanding. 

   The larger teaching of Radical Loving Care is the gift of Benefit of a Doubt. Why do we withhold that from others? It steals from us the fake comfort of self-righteousness & blocks us from offering Love's powerful gift:  Forgiveness.   

  Saints had weaknesses. Why do we think we, our friends, or even our enemies would not?

  We seek the benefit of a doubt. Are we giving it?

-Erie Chapman 

Image: Thetis Dipping the Infant Achilles into the River Styx by Peter Paul Rubens (c. 1625; Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen)

"Come here if you want to find me..." Days 282-286

My camera has always been with me. On a cool evening in 1977 I walked into a nearby field to capture yet another sunset. The beauty was so unbearable my old enemy Melancholy appeared. I changed into my skin & sought God's relief. When it arrived, I wondered, "How do you photograph self comfort?" & made this picture. Forty-five years later I offer it to you with these verses (#26) from the The Radiance Sutras. (italics added.)

The One Who Is at Play Everywhere says,

There is a space in the heart where everything meets.
Come here if you want to find me.
Mind, senses, soul, eternity--all are here.
Are you here?

Enter the bowl of vastness that is the heart.
Listen to the song that is always resonating.
Give yourself to it with total abandon.
Quiet ecstasy is here,
And a steady, regal sense
Of resting in a perfect spot.
You who are the embodiment of blessing,
Once you know the way,
The nature of attention will call you to return.
Again and again, answer that call,
And be saturated with knowing,
"I belong here, I am at home."

Are we alone? Listen as "quiet ecstasy" whispers, "Come here if you want to find me."

-Erie Chapman

"Self Comfort" Double Self Portrait, Erie Chapman, 1978 

 

 

 

 

The Two Most Important Words - Days 273-277

I. 

   No need to write about Ukraine. You know that story & others write it better. One thing, however, defines why Ukraine is succeeding.

  Much as they help, it is not foreign weapons & food. Russians have that too. This other "food" provides the magic that enables "weak" to best strong.  

   Old as humanity, this energy flows when people fight for homeland. This delivers word #1: Meaning. We often write about it here yet most dismiss its power. 

   Meaning is not always enough. But it remains Victory's most crucial food, especially combined with peak performance.

   Depression always steals hope & its energy. Russian soldiers are depressed. 

II.

   Meaning requires actually doing something. The other crucial word appears call for the opposite. 

   How do you do "being?" One choice that helps doers is learning that "being" energy requires training us away from doing energy. The soul (& body) need a rest. That is why to sleep requires letting go. 

   Awake, meditation is a choice. When I learned Transcendental Meditation (TM) in 1975 I discovered how it aids "letting go."

   Some say, "I tried & tried but it didn't work." No wonder.

   The whole deal is not to try. All you do is: 1) close eyes. 2) Repeat "nonsense" sound. A mantra. The idea with the mantra is to divert frenetic thinking away from anxiety-causing thoughts. It works!

   My problem is underestimating TM's impact & stumbling on step one. "Not now," I tell myself, "I've got too much to do!" 

   There are other ways to "be." When I practice meditation, I become much better at living my versions of being & meaning. 

   Meaning & Being. Now, if could just let go of my classic "doer" approach, maybe I could get myself to sit still for twenty minutes twice a day to meditate!

-Erie Chapman

Film Art: "The Sea of Doing & Being" Erie Chapman 2016

Homes of Memory & The RMH Alum Site - Days 266-270

   "The only thing that moves here is the light," Grace (Nicole Kidman) says in "The Others" (2001) Why must this rich woman claim, "This house is ours. This house is ours." Because daughter Anne says, "They're everywhere, they say this house is theirs." "They" turn out to be ghosts.   

   But The Others is not a ghost movie. It is the compelling tale of a woman who controls her children by claiming they are photosensitive. If daylight strikes them, they will die. The metaphor is clear: Truth, like her friends Beauty & Memory, needs light.

   Even though our Memory Houses are ours there is a vast difference in how each treats the trove that lives in their rooms. 

   As one who, even as a child, dwelt on memories, I understand why some treasure them so much they will open doors to horror as well as joy & why others try to avoid that place in their heart.

   It can take courage to let light in. We require a powerful reason. 

   "I can't stand to look at them," my late father-in-law, Leif Lokvam, M.D., would understandably say when invited to view happy family slides, "Too painful." 

   An enlightening home of memory is a Facebook site, RMH Alum (Riverside Methodist Hospital.) Marvelously, its over 3000 followers show how important that hospital was too so many. It is mostly a joyful site even though the place we worked was, by definition, filled with people in deep need. 

   "There never has been a good day in a hospital," my late friend & former RMH CNO, Marian Hamm wrote. Of course, hospitals are filled with the sick. But Marian's leadership that care at Riverside would be no ordinary hospital.

  The RMH Alum site is a powerful House of Memories. One room holds 12 years of memories for me. The great light I experienced then came because the caregivers that worked there were not employees. They were healers. Beyond curing, they engaged a greater gift: Light.  

-Erie Chapman

If you appreciate the Journal, please contribute to the charity that supports it: https://www.eriechapmanfoundation.net. THANK YOU. -erie

 

  

Healing Distraction - A "New" Treatment for dementia! Days 259-263

   It happened with my dear mother-in-law. The scourge of Alzheimers. Scroll back to the weekend Journal for a revolutionary column by Liz Wessel. 

   Despite knowing the reason, the phenomena feels baffling: The person looks the same. But dementia has transformed them. An element of their being is different & requires different approaches. 

   "When is dinner?" Five minutes later, same question. Endlessly. 

   But why do so many become impatient & shout angrily, "I already answered that!"? Because no one offered the alternative described here. 

   It is exhausting to care for patients with dementia. Agonizing loneliness can ensue.

   Ministers encourage endurance. Poets offer aid, as did Emily Dickinson's under-appreciated friend, Anne Reeve Aldrich* (left): "A life of patient suffering, such as I am sure yours must be, dear Miss Dickinson is a better poem in itself than we can any of us write,..." 

   Good news! There are terrific practical ALTERNATIVES. 

   In Liz's spectacular column she describes caring for her Alzheimers-afflicted friend, a former caregiver herself.  I call her process, "Healing Distraction."

   "After a while I find myself at a loss for words." Liz writes, "So, I close my eyes and...hum lullabies from my childhood, Christmas carols, hymns. Gradually she begins to calm." Sometimes, her friend sings too.

   Her second strategy: to discuss patients the friend cared for: "A switch is flipped and over the next hour she talks about her nursing career, little fragments of recollections, hazy but still there. All is calm."

   Aldrich wrote further, "...I believe it is only through the gates of suffering...that we can pass into that tender sympathy with the griefs of all..." Liz is a healer because she has passed through those gates & learned. 

   Her treatments go beyond raw patience to differentiate curing & healing. She "heals" suffering in that moment!  Anxiety yields to Calm.

   THIS is Radical Loving Care^tm (RLC). Imagine how healing this is for both caregiver & patient. 

   Since RLC always goes beyond so does Liz: A note sits near her friend's bed: "Sing Amazing Grace when she becomes anxious."

   The song title describes what happens by practicing Liz's advice: amazing grace settles in. "All is calm."

-Erie Chapman

You are invited to support the Journal via https://www.eriechapmanfoundation.net . Let me know if you contribute so I can thank you directly!:-) 

*Both quote & picture of Aldrich (1866-1892) found in Maria Popova's life changing weblog, The Marginalian. (invite you to follow**) Aldrich wrote self-responsibility before her death at 26:

I made the cross myself, whose weight
Was later laid on me.
This thought adds anguish as I toil
Up life’s steep Calvary.

**The Marginalian – Marginalia on our search for meaning. https://www.themarginalian.org

Detoxifying Memories - Days 252-256

   Imagine three surgeons. Each makes a similar, health-changing mistake with a patient.

   Years later, they meet. One, shamed, suffers depression. "I still have nightmares about that case."

   The second, choosing craven indifference, says, "Not me. I stopped caring about that."

   The third picks the cowardly weapon of blame, "It was a nurse's fault."

   Each could learn from the inimitable David Whyte: "Memory is not just a then, recalled in a now, the past is never just the past..." It is,  "...a then continually becoming other thens, all the while creating a continual but almost untouchable now." 

   Shame, indifference & blaming are Ego's options. A veteran physician friend shared a different approach. "I inserted a needle an inch away from the right spot & caused suffering. I told the patient, took responsibility & will probably get sued. I regret my mistakes & learn form them. I love my patients and I'm a good doctor."  

   By applying a mature label, my friend created a then that makes him an even better doctor now.

   Mislabeling thens sends millions (including me) for psychological help.

   As a dedicated film artist, I study images every day. Fine photography is an art but its apparent reality also makes it one of Memory's messengers of feeling.  

   Artists name their pictures. Occasionally, I rename some of mine. How many of your mind's uglier portraits & events would be detoxified by renaming?  

   It is a giant mistake to think of memories as fixed facts. Two things that change memory are new information & new thinking. 

   Forgiveness is a remarkable way to dilute poisonous thinking, not only for yourself but for anyone else you have demonized as someone who "ruined" your life.

   How many other ways can we interpret thens that would add quality to our remaining nows? Starting with this one?

-Erie Chapman

Photoart by Erie "Emerald Memories" (2022)

 

How You React to your Act: Days 245-249

 One quote my dad loved was, "For every one person that fails because of ability, nine fail because of  a character mistake."* The first time I heard this, a chill went through me. I knew I had many character flaws. Would one leak out, destroy my career & even my life?

   Every caregiver is haunted by such worries. Even though everyone has character flaws, most professionals can minimize or correct mistakes. Sometimes, just one can cause ruination.

   The single ruination mistakes always baffles me. How can Will Smith turn from long-admired to outcast in seconds? One outrageous mistake: The slap of Chris Rock. Smith's apology has not healed the slap to his reputation. 

   Quotes can seem to clash: Successful people always say: "Make mistakes. That's how you grow." I tell clients: It's how you react to your act.

   Sure, we must befriend our difficult partner, Courage . What about his powerful opponent, Unfairness?

   You have likely never heard of Gary Hart. A successful, handsome, Colorado Senator, Hart was a leading candidate for the 1988 Democratic Presidential nomination when he was caught in an affair. Although separated, Hart was pilloried & quit his campaign. 

    Only four years later another candidate was hit with sequential worse charges: Bill Clinton. Why did Hart's error kill his campaign while Clinton not only won but served twice as President & survived impeachment? 

   The reasons do not matter because our core point is different. We are told that failures of career, marriage, or character do not define our worth. Lucky for Donald Trump. 

   How can we best react to our acts? By remembering we are all children of God. Grinding loss can shake that memory. God's Love is our salvation. 

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Photo of Gary Hart by Kenneth Zirkel, 1987

*author unknown

How to Chew Out the Boss...or Not - Days 233-237

  Seinfeld's second season features a delicious skit in which George does what millions consider & few try: He chews out his boss. 

"You think you’re an important man?," George shouts. "You are a laughing stock. a joke...You have no brains, no ability, nothing."

 The source of George's courage? He is quitting. Soon regretful, he sneaks back into a staff meeting the following Monday and tries for mercy.

 "I was just kidding," he tells the boss. No dice.

   This scenario is so endemic to relationships that it is happening right now with millions. Half of a couple explodes...for the 'nth time. The other half takes it for the 'nth time until one day they don't.

   Soon, the angry one regrets it, seeks mercy but makes George's mistake: Pretends for the 'nth time it was "nothing." 

   Should mercy requests always be granted? The Christian answer is often yes. The human answer is often otherwise.

   It takes time for children to learn remorse. Some adults never do. They beg for mercy & are outraged when it is withheld. Like George, they claim, "I didn't mean it."

   Remorse makes healing possible. When Remorse leaves the room, he takes Mercy with him.

   We need jobs. We need relationships. 

   Yet, caregivers dealing with a hard bosses & leaders dealing with difficult staff think in binary terms: explode or stuff their feelings.

   We sell off pieces of our soul at work & home stuck in a dangerous mindset: "I'm right. You are wrong. That's it."

   The idea of offering the benefit of a doubt is foreign to these beings. 

   Among the most important things I learned from dear friend Tracy Wimberly is the concept of "Both/And". There are always additional choices. 

  How much of America's internal strife is rooted in thinking there are only two answers, one right, one wrong? Is that why the chorus of people who say "Our country is so divided" keeps growing louder?  

-Erie Chapman

   [The Journal was born (& lives) as a voluntary effort. All columns are from me, weekender Liz Wessel, or others . If you believe we support caregiver's lives, please contribute (tax deductible.) Click "Donate" at: www.eriechapmanfoundation.net. ANYTHING! We have always been free & ad-free in serving 250,000 readers. For the first time, we seek your contributions. Let us show our board your support. Profound thanks! - Erie]

What Do You See? Days 213-217

  There are four art works in the photo, taken in 2017 at the Museum of Modern Art (re-edited for this essay.)

   If all four were $100 each & you had to buy one, which would it be?

   One was valued in 2019 at 1.2 billion dollars. The others? Not so much.  

   As someone who now spends most of his life on film art, I am endlessly fascinated by how people see. 

   The average museum goer spends 7 seconds before a masterpiece. Consider the nine people in that room. Seven have lost interest. Only two (one barely visible) attend to the masterpiece.

   How rapidly do we scroll cell phone photos? A quarter second per picture?

   When anyone looks at a painting the brain asks first: What or who is it? Next! Scrolling is faster than page turning.

   How many caregivers see patients as people first & diagnosis second?

   Want to see with sacred eyes? Look at this picture, or any, for a full minute. Better yet, try ten. Share what you see & how you feel.

   The billion dollar masterpiece is the Picasso at top right. I made the other three, available for a bargain price. Maybe a donation to the foundation that sponsors this Journal?*

-Erie Chapman

*In the Journal's 16 year history (supported by volunteers) we have never asked for contributions to support Radical Loving Care^®. If you wish, go to www.eriechapmanfoundation.net  Click the "Donate" button. $1 is fine. Thank you:-) 

**All photographs by Erie.

Riverside Memories for ALL Caregivers - Days 206-210

There is a reason hospitals and courtrooms are the stages for so many movies and t.v. shows. Drama. Drama built from memories of childhood and from careers of caregiving for those in deep need.   

I. SLICES OF SUNLIGHT

From early childhood on, memories illuminate the present. David Whyte wrote, “…memory [determines] how we live the story we have inherited.”

What childhood recollections help you today? Here is one of my earliest: 

At age 3 I drowsed through naps who’s light, smells & sounds flicker today. Because those and other memories are sweet they are hand-painted films that play to the rhythmic clicking of my father’s 16 mm film projector, the thrum of single engine WWII planes soloing toward the Pacific, the splash of Mr. Scott’s garden hose washing his driveway.

But it is the light of those childhood naps, not the sounds, that shine my life 75 years later. And memory always seeks sunnier rooms when meaner moments appear.

Today, my soul dwells in a long ago bedroom where the floor is lines with neatly cut slices of light carved by Venetian blinds, angles toss dust motes, my mother turns the pages of books in which she colored dreams for me.

I was lucky...and still am. But memories can, obviously, trouble the present. Often, the hardest memories can trigger changes that create better lives for others.

This is not a rehash of old news. It is a call to communities to recognize that hospitals need leaders that celebrate caregivers, not the bottom line. When it is the other way around, many suffer. 

The RMH Alum Facebook page has been life-changing in awakening memories that matter. It triggered recollections of moments that mattered

Whyte says, “…memory creates and influences what is about to happen…” Regardless of where you work, remember to pay attention when leadership changes

II. A FORSHADOWING

One day in 1990, the late Jack Chester and I had a chilling discussion in the lobby that welcomed people to Riverside Hospital (A display honors him in the current lobby.) Jack was a prominent divorce lawyer and key board member at Riverside and OhioHealth while I was CEO of one & founding President of the other.

Importantly, board members like Mr. Chester, not doctors or first line caregivers, choose and remove CEOs.

“Things are going great here,” Jack told me on that fateful day. “Why?”

“Our culture. It’s based on love,” I answered.

“You can’t measure that!” he pronounced in his naturally argumentative lawyer’s voice. “What can’t be measured doesn’t matter.”

“How much do you love your kids?” I asked.

“A lot, of course.”

“But how much? Can you measure that?”

“Of course not,” he laughed. He did not agree or did not understand. As one myself, I know how hard it is to convince lawyers.

“What cannot be measured matters most,” I told Jack.

“Okay,” he muttered. “Well, whatever you’re doing keep it up.”

“Thanks,” I said.

But as I walked away, a shiver ran through me. A key leader did not accept love’s meaning in "the caregiving business." Was the shiver from an Old Testament prophet whispering: “Beware”?

In 1995 Jack Chester, the one who's image decorates the entrance to a special hospital, the one who dismissed Love as unmeasurable, measured out the plank for me and got others to make me walk it. His action caused others to walk it as well. 

Or did he? Maybe I was at fault, a victim of naiveté or vanity. Maybe, after twelve years, it really was time for a change. Anyway, many other lives changed after that day.

III. IT'S ALL ABOUT THE CAREGIVERS

Those negatively affected by the leadership change did not deserve the fallout. This includes leaders pushed to leave, those laid off and those who, in staying, faced a sharp culture change in their workplace. 

That is because the removal of any key leader jars an organization more than most foresee.

As people bid me goodbye in 1995 I could tell some thought; "It's not me that has to leave," or "This change won't matter."

I knew they were mistaken.

The successors took a different path. I did not agree but that does not mean it was wrong.  

Once again, this is not about me. I was simply a catalyst for a certain kind of success. New leaders caused new changes with other results. 

Good leaders hire good people that create cultures of caring. Bad leaders do the opposite. The vast group in between is colored gray. 

People go to hospitals out of deep need. That is why hospital leadership matters.

Who matters most to patients? No patient entering the ER ever asks, "Have you got enough executives here?"

Because Riverside can be a proxy for how any organization is led, this series will continue.  Bless you who continue to enrich the legacy of loving care regardless of your leader.

Meanwhile, I'm an old man now and get to take naps. The kind where I can drowse through a summer afternoon the way I did as a child: watching the way Venetian blinds carve sunlight into slices that paint beauty on the floor. And I can savor the memory of the privilege of having helped lead, nurture & create a better life for thousands of the world's best caregivers...and the patients we served. 

-Erie Chapman 

The WORTH of Self Worth - Days 199-203

   Value yourself so you can to value others.   

   "You've done a brilliant job," the board chair told me on a black sunny day in 1995. "Because of your leadership we have far exceeded expectations in every area." 

  We were sitting in the bright living room of my Columbus. Before me was the person upon whom my career depended most. As often happens, the chair's endorsement presaged a nightmare. My joyful career was dissolving in the air like a tablet of sunshine

   Lurking in the chair's eyes was the ghost of bad news. He was the doctor who shocks you with: "You're in perfect health. In a moment you will die."

   "Erie, it's been a fabulous 12 years," he said in the past tense. "You're an innovator, have led us to the top & the best leader I've ever met."

   His eyes fell to the floor. My heart went with them. "It's time for a change," he pronounced.

   "This is unfair," he confessed, "but you've been ambushed. Nothing to be done." 

   Unbeknown to him, he would also be ambushed; pushed out soon by another member.  

   Such injustices are so endemic to organizations & relationships that the cliche is, "Life is unfair."

   Because this is about self worth, another chapter awaits. 

   As foretold in Beowulf, a worse fate came. Until that Sunday, I subconsciously thought self worth & career success were intertwined. I had forgotten the obvious: I did not "own" my job anymore then I owned my family (pictured.)

   Hospitals are "kingdoms" & CEOs have royal powers. Every leader should appreciate that "firing" is a violent word. Termination can resemble homicide: Careers killed, homes lost, families destroyed, bankruptcies filed. Obviously, with over 11,000 staff & 2000 doctors at OhioHealth, the system I founded, I was responsible for firing as well as hiring. 

   The key question is not career loss. It is spiritual failure. Success had blessed me & would again. Yet, on that Sunday, a piece of my soul broke off & floated away. It took years to heal by discovering that core truth we know but I could not absorb: We are not our jobs. 

   Again, the problem is not in knowing that. It is finding humility before God & the graceful appreciation of life. 

   Others will define us. It is foolish to live by their definition.

   Success lives in recognizing that no boss, spouse, friend, lover, patient, or company can take your self worth. Self-worth & self-love are feelings we truly own. 

   Here are words worth remembering from Maxime Lagacé: "Your self-worth grows when you fight for something you love."

-Erie Chapman