The Power to Listen. The Power to Empathize.
Jeni was quiet. I’d hurt her, I knew. I could see in her eyes that there was no going back. She didn’t say a word. We were done. We didn’t speak again.
High School
Hong Kong. I spent my formative years in a British high school here. It was a place of privilege, I recognize now, filled with all nationalities. It was also a place with all your typical high school woes and concerns that seemed to mean the world—for it was your world. A place where you can be an ethnic majority in the city but a minority in your weekday world. A place where British sarcasm and biting judgement was augmented by high school insecurities and built on top of a foundation of 6 million hustling, self-absorbed, individuals on a tiny island.
Those years honed a number of, for lack of a better term, “skills.” In learning to verbally defend myself, I learned irony, snark, and biting insults. I also learned to verbally hurt—and I’m not talking about, “your momma,” jokes or anything quite so trite. I felt I had developed an ability to really dig into a person’s flaws or, more accurately, their insecurities over what their flaws might be, and amplify them.
Worst yet, I prided myself in these skills. It felt powerful. It was my power.
About a Decade Later…
Austin, TX. My first job out of college brought me to this liberal aberration of Texas. I love this town and met many longtime friends here.
Near the end of my time there, I spent an inordinate amount of time with two people: Mike and Jeni. We spent almost every day together and our adventures were wide and varied. Days on the lake, road trips to taste test Texan barbecue, days being completely goofy at a home, sharing stories of romance, sharing shoulders of support…
One day, Jeni and I got into a heated debate—I don’t even recall what about. Jeni was one of the closest friends I’d ever had so it was easy to tap into that power. I was angry and disappointed at her. I probably just wanted my way and wanted to guilt her. Or hurt her. Or both.
So in that moment, I unleashed.
She didn’t say a word. We were done. We didn’t speak again.
In many ways, this story is hugely unsatisying because the central action of the story is a blur. Its details have been lost in time with only its effects still felt like a phantom limb. What was it about? What did I say? It doesn’t matter.
Today
San Francisco, CA. I’ve been to Burning Man 6 years in a row. This year will be my 7th. It will be the first year that I work on building an art piece and the first year I will be involved with burning an art piece. With the help of my campmates at Friendlandia, in particular the designers Krista Sanders and Rob Bell (who builds these amazing Zomes), we are bringing The Śiṣya (pronounced SHI-shya), an art piece on loss and transformation.
In making the video for The Śiṣya, I was called upon to tell a story of loss and how it changed me. As I’m sure we all do, I had many to choose from—some shallower, some more recent, some even more raw.
But this memory of a past friend from a lifetime ago called to me. Because, though there was no turning back that moment, there was an opportunity to change for the future.
That one experience with Jeni is the point I realized that the closer you are to someone, the more you can hurt them. When someone allows themselves to be close to you, they are allowing themselves to be vulnerable, and trusting you with power to hurt them.
I can’t say I’ve never hurt anyone since then, but I can say that I’ve been much more mindful and caring of the trust given to me. I still make mistakes, still hurt people, still mishandle situations, but that one single experience was absolutely a turning point for me.
I’ve never been the same since that day. That day, I learned to turn the power to hurt into the even greater power to empathize.
Transformation
Black Rock City. The dust is blowing past your eyes but in the distance, you see The Man. A little closer in, a spiraling structure is calling to you. As you walk towards the spiral, you can smell the dust…or is it the pine plywood of the intricate cut outs in front of you?
The spiral is a wave, washing over you. You feel the wave. You are the wave. You read the stories of loss and transformation and recall your own. Recall how you did not overcome them, but they became you…a better you, a more powerful you.
You leave a note. You leave a memento. You come back on Thursday night. And you watch in awe as the wave, your wave, is ignited with the wave of light and flames and dust and heat.
You watch the transformation begin.
I wrote this piece to reflect on my experiences and explain some of the motivations for working on the piece. If this art piece speaks to you, please consider donating to help with its creation (no donation is too small), sharing with your friends, and hitting “recommend” below. I’ll also be writing next week about our camp Friendlandia and how we want to help recognize and celebrate friendships. Thanks for reading..
