“Teach Me, Sifu”: Learning From My Wife
“TEACH ME, SIFU”
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Tananarive just got back from the writing workshop at her alma mater’s journalism department, created by George RR Martin. It is for journalists who want to write fiction. I know the numbers involved, and they are impressive. But this is common practice among masters.
They are always learning, always doing, and always teaching. Look at that as being a conduit for power in the universe. You take in, hold for just a moment, and then let it go to make room for what comes next.
And love all three aspects. Its possible that this level can be divided into “expertise”, “mastery” and “magic.”
At the level of “magic” you just chop wood, carry water. Just do the things you do in your life, in alignment with your heart, and in fall you take the harvest. Winter comes, but you have prepared, and will survive until the next spring, when the cycle begins again.
I’ve commented that Tananarive is better prepared for the goal she set herself than anyone I’ve ever known. It was both knowing what she wanted to do from the age of four, being totally supported by her family and community, and having a HUNGER to give back. Everything she writes is rooted to her love of tribe. And while she has several “tribes” (the horror community, journalists, biological family, friends, etc.) she has a special love of her ethnic/racial tribe, having been taught that sticks can be broken easily, but BUNDLES of sticks are strong.
Politics is in her blood. It really overlaps with her philosophies of life. She can simply get up, connect to her family, feel the commitment, select the actions that will strengthen her tribe, and then perform them, having fun along the way.
If I deconstruct who she is, I can see it, organic and strong. The MAGIC formula is so deeply entrained that you can barely pry the pieces apart.
She has a crystal clear MAP of action, and an amazing role MODEL in her mother, civil rights icon Patricia Stephens Due.
She takes daily ACTION. I mean, she writes EVERY day. The only form of “block” she experiences is letting herself get distracted from her primary project. This is why REFORMATORY took seven years: a part of her didn’t’ want to write it, but simultaneously has this internal bias toward action. See how her unconscious mind fooled her? “You’ve busy, so all is well!” Ummm….no.
She has GRATITUDE. Tananarive really is amazingly joyful. Really. There are certainly times when she is “down”, and in those times I am “up.” But the reverse is true. If you think I’m irritatingly optimistic, you definitely couldn’t handle the two of us. And a primary gratitude is for finding each other. Now, we both have 100% confidence that if we hadn’t, we’d have found other wonderful partners. There are a ton of good people in the world, and some of them will be attracted to you if YOU would be attracted to you. People are attracted to energy: the quantity and quality of it. And as she has great physical energy (she works out almost daily, one of the first things I noticed about her was that she moved like a healthy animal. This was a basic requirement) PLUS great focus, someone tuned to her channel was gonna pick up her signal. It really is that simple. But we understand that we have something unique and precious, and that the path we walk together satisfies us both on deep levels. This is GOOD. We both steep ourselves in gratitude daily (“blessing dance”) and that gives us courage and faith.
She has clear INTENTIONS. And has as long as she can remember. Wrote her first book at the age of four, “Baby Bobby.” And looking at it (she still has it!) there is nothing there other four year olds couldn’t do. The difference is that she kept doing it, and found the resources to support her. Some of those were family, yes. But the moment I fell in love with her was when I realized how damned SMART she was about navigating the world: the story about how she got Stephen King to give her a cover blurb is spectacular, evidence of creativity, courage, clarity…well, all of Brendon Burchard’s “High Performance Six” techniques. She’s got ’em wired tight.
She acts from her CORE. Everything she does is connected to childhood dreams and family mythology. It really is amazing.
I am a Frankenstein monster of often mis-matched parts, having been given nothing but a good mind, belief I was lovable, and the strategy of modeling other successful people. If I’d not had self-love I’d have started my focus there. Had I had any sense I wasn’t smart enough, I’d have focused on Mastermind teams: finding someone who WAS smart and strong, and serving them to get my own goals. If this gives you some insight into my relation ship with Niven and Pournelle, you are catching on. All I had to offer them was integrity and energy, an open heart and empty cup: “teach me, Sifu.” All because my mother introduced me to things like Think And Grow Rich, which suggested a specific syntax for action.
Its so much fun to see what happens when parents understand the social chess board and carefully prepare their children. And I can see what my Mom couldn’t give me, but had the wisdom to understand I would need.
And I can see how even as an adult, if you make a commitment to your internal child to “parent” her as if she’d had an ideal upbringing, there are tools to facilitate this…but you must find a teacher, empty your cup, and say “teach me, Sifu.”
I sure as hell know why Tananarive reveres her Mom and Dad. And why she has such commitment to our son. And in creating our nest together, we understand the PRIMARY “mastermind” creating our world is our own internal integrity, the solidity of our unconscious construction — at which she exceeds me. Oh, I’m not putting myself down. I LOVE what I’ve created for myself. But know that had I had that kind of support….well, lets just put it this way: her mother supported her desire to be a writer 100%. My mother burned my stories.
Tananarive has said, in no uncertain terms, that she doesn’t think her writing career would have survived that. She’d probably have been a journalist. And then, maybe one day she would be invited to a workshop to turn journalists into novelists and screenwriters, funded by George RR Martin…
See the loop? See how she is nurturing her own younger self? Wow. I have so much love, admiration, and respect for her, AND her family. And there are definitely times when I acknowledge my own skills, put them in my pocket, humble myself and say:
Teach me, Sifu.
Namaste.
Steve
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