How to help others catch up to how you've changed.
That was 12 Joan’s ago.
Yeah, what a phrase. Thanks to a Rob Bell podcast. I’m trying it out. “That was 8 Joan’s Ago” or “That was 4 Joan’s ago.” To me, a light-hearted way to say, “Hey, I’m different than that incident/role/behavior you remember about me.”
It’s a timely topic because today, March 19, is the Spring Equinox. Twelve glorious hours of sunlight almost everywhere on Earth. When the sun’s rays shine on the equator today, our planet is leaning neither toward or away from the sun, so everybody gets a pretty equal share of sunshine.
In that spirit, this phrase gives you and me equal shares of grace to acknowledge, “Hey, I’m different now. I’ve changed.”
Let me explain.
“That Was 12 Joan’s Ago”
Not long ago I was at an event where work colleagues got together—some I knew, some I didn’t— and a former executive I’d worked with leaned in with a laugh, “I warned some people here about you. You couldn’t keep people on your team.” Ouch! He drew back, embarrassed I’m guessing by my shocked face, because that was like “12 Joan’s Ago.” It’s true there was a time when in floundering as a leader of teams, I had people leaving. But I figured it out, thanks to books and mentors and the associates themselves who gave me honest feedback. I own that; I regret that upheaval. Yet, I changed. Thanks to the teams, we went on to do great work. This guy’s perception of me hadn’t kept up.
It’s the Polaroid effect. People take a mental snapshot, stamp that photo in thought and presume we’re always stuck in that picture.
I’m not sure what his “warning” to others was all about. He probably meant it as a put-down, but I do believe that the reason this incident resurfaced in my memory for this essay was not about any potential insult, but rather how at the time it struck me as so incongruent to who I’d become. That young leader “Joan" who made regrettable management mistakes had left the building a long time ago.
“That was 12 Joan’s ago.” I could have said then, with a little laugh. Help him catch up.
Something I like about this phrase is how it shows you own your past. “That was me all right.” No defensiveness. Own it with love and humility and, as Rob Bell says, fierceness too.
Ferocity because sometimes the way we’re remembered also serves that individual’s view of the world and how it operates. We gotta jar that view. They are stuck in a time that serves them and it hasn’t been updated.
Let me give a gentle example. I remember a conversation I had with my mother-in-law. We’re in her one-bedroom apartment in a retirement facility. My MIL had immigrated to the States from Cuba in the 1950’s. By then, she’d spent more years in the U.S. than her native Havana. It’s a Saturday morning. My husband is putting away her weekly grocery request about ten feet away in the kitchenette. By then, we’d put our kids through college and I’d worked myself up in my organization, plus my husband was a senior executive. I’m kneeling by her recliner, practicing my Spanish in an everyday conversation when she suddenly shakes her head. “Lo siento por ti, Joan, eres pobre," she laments.
Puzzled, I switch to English. “Mami, you’re sad for me? You think we’re poor?” I glance at my husband. He shrugs his shoulders.
She sighs and says, “You have to work.”
What?
Perhaps she recalled the years I’d been a stay-at-home mom when the kids were little, but that young mom—full of plans for playdates and toilet training and neighborhood potlucks—was easily 20 Joan’s Ago. Another state, another chapter in life, a young woman with no idea what lay ahead.
Not the Joan my MIL was patiently talking in Spanish with. The Joan who knelt by her chair with chapters of life experiences my MIL couldn’t fathom since her frame of reference was a cultural framework of women and their roles that hadn’t budged much even though she’d lived through decades of two feminist movements, redefining the contributions women make to society.
It was a loving lesson to me of being stuck in time. When someone thinks of me as that Joan from the past, it’s not just a Polaroid snapshot then, but also their worldview reflecting back to them how things ought to be. And that can be scary for them to let go.
That’s why ferocity is important. “That was 20 Joan’s Ago.” Let that concept of me go, and see the me in front of you now.
Worldview Is Such a Treasure Trove in Historical Fiction
I have some fun with these ideas in my book. Showing how a character changes over time (character arc) is Writing Craft 101. In storytelling, we expect—in fact, we even root for the character— to change. One of the small examples I use is how Jo’s childhood BFF Anna grapples with trying to calibrate the old and new Jo.
By necessity, Jo van Gogh (the famous artist’s sister-in-law) must step up and create a new identify for herself to tout Vincent’s art when neither society, decorum, tradition, nor culture support her. For a time, Anna who is the product of her time (as we all are) draws away. She can’t reconcile the “10 Jo’s Ago” snapshot she holds in thought with this new Jo who is a single mother and boardinghouse manager and, strangest of all, art promoter.
In time (spoiler alert), they reunite, and you know what? Anna changes too. Yes, this is fiction, but I’m hoping it illustrates some of the impact of recognizing “10 Jo’s Ago” in another. Accepting another’s changes cracks the door open toward giving us grace to allow for change in ourselves too.
I have to tell you, I know that thinking about how characters react to each other in story is basic, but as I’ve been working through copy edits, I’ve continued over and over to want to go deeper in each scene in just this way. After all, it was at least 2-3 Joan’s Ago that I originally wrote the story—lol! But today, I finally let the rewrites go and returned the copy edits to my publisher.
I can always incorporate new ideas into Book 2.
Change Is Hard
Aldous Huxley said, “In wisdom gathered over time I have found that every experience is a form of exploration.”
I’m obsessed with exploring the themes of growth and change. No doubt some of it is a reaction against the societal rigidity at least the media pundits keep railing about. Are we really that stuck? I think there’s space to continue to stretch, open ourselves in empathy to understand where and how another person came to their worldview. Be willing to question, think critically about assumptions and declarations and recognize that—if we choose it— we’re on a path of continuous discovery.
If this intrigues you, check out a terrific newsletter that takes unique angles on change:
Culture Study. It’s given me new ideas to mull over.
Enjoy the sunshine!
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