“Our Covid-19 polarization will only get worse. We need to find a balance.”
Gary Abernathy [1]
“The balancing of individual liberty and public health may be among the most contentious issue in American life.”
Dhruv Khullar [2]
“Her genius was to find that balance.”
H. Resit Akcakaya, about Georgina Mace [3]
We live in troubled – and troubling- times, yet it is clear that we are not the first nor will we be the last generation to sense this. All times are new those who live in them, and, uncharted as they are, they are unpredictable and often surprising. Each comes with its own variety of troubles. Yet modern times seem to bring a different order of troubles. “Each day things get just a little more complex,” wrote Bill Dauphinais and his colleagues in 1996. “Each day there are new contradictions. Each day new paradoxes emerge. Each day edges forward what feels more like chaos.” [4] More complexity, new contradictions, new paradoxes, more chaos. Since they wrote these words in the 1990’s, no evidence has emerged that suggests that the times have shifted into reverse, from complex to simple, from chaotic to orderly, from contradictory to consensual.
What are we to do? Over a hundred years ago, Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. offered a suggestion: “I see it all perfectly; there are two possible situations – one can either do this or that. My honest opinion and my friendly advice is this: do it or do not do it – you will regret both.” [5] While Holmes’ tone was ironic, he was on to something. When we are facing a choice, no matter which of the alternatives we choose, the consequences that follow that choice must be addressed. And, face-to-face with the contractions, complexities and paradoxes of our lives, and uncertain of the consequences of choosing one alternative over the other, we hesitate to decide. And so, a new challenge: “We must all face something for which we have…not been [prepared:] life in the messy middle,” insist Dauphinais and his associates in The Paradox Principles. [6]
What Is Required to Succeed in “Messy Middle?”
Begin with courage.
Courage is a word we know well and use often, usually to praise the actions of individuals who, when confronted with danger, go beyond what is expected of them. It made its appearance early in our lives when we were frightened, and our parents reassured us and told us to be brave. It was at the center of the stories they read to us at bedtime. It continued to appear in the books and movies we enjoyed as teenagers and young adults. As we grew older, courage became less obvious, often appearing as context in the books, movies and plays that we enjoyed. Through all this, we learned that society values courage, and when people act courageously, they are honored and held up as examples to be emulated.
Courage is defined in the dictionary as “a quality of spirit that allows you to face danger or pain without showing fear.” This does not suggest that courageous people do not feel fear, only that they do not show it. Most of daily life does not require courage. It is held in reserve and only makes an appearance when we contemplate taking actions that challenge us and, at the same time, generate fear. Among the questions that brings courage to life is some variation of, “Who is the person who will confront evil and defend and protect loved ones, the community, or the nation?”
A Poet’s Courage
Philip Booth’s poem, “Sixty-Three,” begins with a question:
“Man I thought I knew well,
feeling his age, asked me
outright, What do you believe?…
I thought of my daughter
in her hard time;
“I know,” I said, “without love
there is no music. No music left
to lift hard weathers, to lend
old courage its greatest gift;
to keep believing in love. [7]
Love comes, says the poet, and fosters the music that sustains the courage to keep believing in love. It is all of a piece, and courage is the core.
Aristotle’s “Desirable Middle”
Understanding courage is complicated. The dictionary defines it as facing danger while not showing fear, while the poet believes it is courage the makes possible the human experience of expressing and receiving love. Aristotle, the Greek philosopher, approaches it from a different perspective. Fear is peripheral to courage, and love plays no part. He begins by identifying courage as one of the four cardinal virtues – the other three are prudence, temperance and justice – and, according to the New World Encyclopedia, proposes that all virtues, including courage, exist as a desirable middle between two extremes, one being excess and the other deficiency. Aristotle’s view of courage, then, is a balance between two extremes: recklessness on the one hand and cowardice on the other. Before taking action, a courageous person decides that what she is about to do is worth doing and not just a reckless impulse. And while she may feel fear, she does not give in to it as a reason for choosing not to act.
Decisions at the Center
Making decisions is at the center of much of what we do day-in and day-out. Former Dupont CEO Chad Holliday once remarked “Dupont has over six thousand managers, each of whom must make four or five decisions a day.” [8] If they make four decisions, then every day they will make 24,000 decisions; if five, then their combined total will be 30,000. Clearly, at least from Holliday’s perspective, decision making in Dupont is huge!
Holliday’s frame of reference for the thousands of decisions made each day at Dupont was undoubtedly “Decisions that are part of working at Dupont.” Once we pull back from the business setting, however, the total number of decisions made by any one individual in a day will be significantly larger, perhaps by a factor of 200 or so.
Actually, trying to estimate the number of decisions that a person makes in a day is a fool’s errand: Almost everything we do involves making a decision. “Shall I have eggs or cereal for breakfast?” “Should I choose the brown suit or the blue one?” “Should I take the freeway or the back roads?” “Is today the day to bring up the human resource problem in the meeting or wait until next week?” “Which is best, supporting John or Peter.” We can’t get through fifteen minutes without making a number of decisions,
Most of the decisions we make are trivial, quickly made and easily forgotten. Usually, we are unaware that we are making a decision. They blend in easily with the normal flow of everyday life. It is only when decisions are difficult and suggest the possibility of serious consequences that may follow if we make a bad one, that our attention is aroused. Sociologist F. G. Bailey’s perspective is helpful: “Life is a series of problems. We are continuously faced with alternative possibilities, both between goals and strategies for achieving goals, and only by making the correct choices do we become masters of the situation and of our own destinies.” [9] The advantage lies, not in choosing, but in making the correct choice. And with this, a new problem: We believe that any decision we are about to make is the “correct choice.” Otherwise, we would not make it. It is only later, with the benefit of hindsight, that we can know if it was good or bad.
Decisions Begin as Problems
Decisions do not appear fully formed and waiting for us to choose. Making a decision requires a structure which, once in place, makes choosing possible. This structure begins – or should begin – with the awareness that all decisions have their roots in problems. Someone decides that something isn’t working as it should, or that the performance of an individual, a team or an organization falls short of expectations, or someone is experiencing distress. What we end up calling a problem, then, begins as a signal that something needs our attention. And this leads to more decisions: what should be done and who should do it? Rushing to make changes based upon an emerging awareness that something needs to be done is a mistake and usually makes things worse. Nothing should happen until there is a clear understanding of what the problem actually is, why it is a problem, and and who wants to see changes made.
When important decisions are being considered that affect our relationships, our careers, and our lives, the problems that lie behind the decisions need to be identified and defined before any decisions are made to make things better.
In summary, then, good decisions must begin at the beginning: what is the problem that needs to be addressed the requires a decision? Until that question has an answer that those involved can agree with, there is little that can be done except complain, whine, or blame others, behaviors that inevitably create a set of new problems. Being worried, upset, or angry can serve as the beginnings of a problem, but until they fit into the framework of a problem – what is the problem and what should be done about it – they are not yet problems. When someone says, “I have a problem, I’m really worried,” it is important to remember that being worried is not a problem.
Good Decisions Require Good Alternatives.
An individual or group making a choice between two or more alternatives is the sine qua non of a decision. As we suggested earlier, however, not all decisions are good decisions. For them to be good, two conditions, among others, need to be addressed: the problem that is the source of the discomfort or misunderstanding, and that is driving the decision forward, must be identified and defined; and two or more viable options need to be in place which permit a choice. If you wish to buy a shirt, and all of the shirts for sale are blue, then no decision about color is required.
Choosing one of two alternatives is often described as an Either/Or decision. In a later chapter in this book -“Huck Finn Messes With Mr. In-between” – we describe Huckleberry’s predicament: send a letter to Miss Watson informing her where she can find Jim, her escaped slave who has floated on a raft down the Mississippi with Huck, or forget Miss Watson and continue to help Jim escape. He must choose one or the other, but cannot choose both.
Other decisions have a different structure. For Both/And decisions, rather than choose one of two alternatives, the decision maker is expected to choose both at the same time. As we shall see, struggling with Both/And decisions makes the process of decision making much more complicated.
An example of a Both/And decision was discussed in CEO Daily, a newsletter authored by Alan Murray. In the November 12, 2020 edition, Murray quotes Arvind Krishna, the CEO of IBM: “Purpose and profit go together, reinforcing each other. I’d actually argue if you don’t have a purpose as a company, you will be less successful from a results perspective.” [1o] Leadership in business, then, involves making money and defining a purpose for the organization that goes beyond profits. Jim Collins, author of Good to Great, quotes a twenty-something who said that his generation, “requires a whole new way of leading…We demand that our leaders not only provide direction, but they also tell us why. And it needs to be a ‘why’ that’s much more than maximizing profits for shareholders.” [11]
Either/Or Decisions Can Be Difficult. Both/And Decisions Are Worse
“The way of paradoxes is the way of truth.”
Oscar Wilde (1854 – 1900)
Playwright, Toast of London, Convict
Some decisions are easy and require little effort. Others can be difficult, especially when the two choices in an Either/Or decision are equally attractive or unattractive. Even more difficult, however, are the Both/And decisions. They are often framed as paradoxes, statements or propositions that are seemingly contradictory or opposed to common sense, yet, upon a deeper examination, may contain more complicated levels of truth. Examples of paradoxical demands for leaders and managers in business organization are listed in Rosabeth Kanter’s When Giants Learn to Dance and identified as the “The new game” in business:
– “Be entrepreneurial and take risks, [and] don’t cost the business
anything by failing.”
– “Continue to do everything you’re currently doing even better [and]
spend more time communicating with employees, serving on teams,
and launching new projects.”
– “Know every detail of your business [and] delegate more responsibility to others.”
– “Speak up, be a leader, set the direction [and] be participative, listen well,
cooperate.”
– Communicate a sense of urgency and push for faster execution, faster results
[and] take more time of deliberately planner the future.”
– “Succeed, succeed, succeed [and] raise terrific children.” [12]
Another set of problems that require Both/And decisions is reported to be on the office wall of every leader and manager of Lego, the Danish toy maker. Here are several examples:
“Every manager in Lego Systems, Inc., should be able to:
– Build close relationships – and keep a suitable distance.
– Trust one’s staff – and keep an eye on what is happening.
– Freely express your own point of view – and be diplomatic.
– Be dynamic – and be reflexive.
– Be sure of yourself – and be humble.
– Be able to lead – and hold oneself in the background.” [13]
Neither list of demands offer the manager the opportunity to choose one or the other, but clearly expect that both goals will be met. While Kanter’s are abstractions distilled from interviews with leaders, the Lego list can be seen as a set of directives: guidelines, norms, expectations or, depending upon how seriously they are taken, rules. Yet how managers are supposed to go about achieving both goals at the same time is not made clear. Success in achieving any one of these directives can be daunting. “Be able to lead,” for example, is sufficiently vague and ambiguous that leaders could argue that almost anything that they do is evidence of their ability to lead. Adding its opposite side – “and hold oneself in the background” – complicates things and can make any attempt to do at the same time seem to be impossible. In her book, Kanter acknowledges the difficulties involved. After listing the 11 paradoxical demands that business leaders must address, she adds this disclaimer: “These demands come from every part of business and personal life, and they increasingly seem incompatible and impossible.” [14] Yet incompatible or not, they also seem to be part of how things are expected to be accomplished. In The Age of Paradox, Charles Handy makes the case that no matter how fervently we wish that these paradoxes would vanish, they are here to stay: “Paradoxes I now see to be inevitable, endemic and perpetual. [We] can and should reduce the starkness of some of the contradictions, minimize the inconsistencies, understand the puzzles in the paradox, but [we] cannot make them disappear, solve them completely, or escape from them.” [15]
The Friedman Doctrine and the Business Roundtable
Most personal and organizational goals are singular. A problem is identified, followed by setting a goal, and then choosing actions that will achieve the goal and “solve” the problem. Changing times, however, bring changing expectations; increasingly, as we have seen, in order to solve a problem, some goals become plural. People are expected – or required – to achieve two or more seemingly competing goals at the same time.
In 1970, economist Milton Friedman published an essay in the New York Times titled “A Friedman Doctrine: The Social Responsibility for Business is to Increase Its Profits.” His argument was that a company has no social responsibility to it’s employees, the public, or to society; its only responsibility is to its shareholders. In other words, the purpose of business is to make money for those who own shares. “Insofar as [a business executive’s] actions in accord with his ‘social responsibility’ reduce returns to stockholders, he is spending their money,” he argued. He ended his essay by stating, “there is one and only one social responsibility of business – to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits…” [16]
The Friedman Doctrine – known as Shareholder theory – has had a significant impact in the corporate world. In 2016, The Economist called it “the biggest idea in business,” adding, “today shareholder value rules business.” [17] In 2017, Harvard professors Joseph Bowers and Lynn Paine wrote that “it is now pervasive in the financial community and much of the business world. It has led to a set of behaviors by many actors on a wide range of topics, from performance measurement and executive compensation to shareholder rights…” [18]
For CEO’s, the Friedman Doctrine served to reinforce a traditional goal: make money. In 1997, the Business Roundtable, the most powerful lobbying group for big business, adopted Stockholder Theory as a company’s driving purpose: “The paramount duty of management and boards of directors is to the corporation’s stockholders.” [19]
Fast forward to the second decade of the 21st century and everything has changed. In August, 2019 the same Business Roundtable published a new manifesto:
“While each of our individual companies serves its own corporate purpose, we share a fundamental commitment to all of our stakeholders. We commit to:
– Delivering value to our customers.
– Investing in our employees…We foster diversity and inclusion, dignity and respect.
– Dealing fairly and ethically with our suppliers.
– Supporting the communities in which we work.
– Protect[ing] the environment.
– Generating long-term value for shareholders.” [20]
“It’s time for a new kind of capitalism,” said Marc Benioff, chief executive of Salesforce, and a member of the Business Roundtable, “stakeholder capitalism, which recognizes that our companies have a responsibility to all our stakeholders. Yes, that includes shareholders, but also our employees, customers, communities and the planet.” [21] Howard Schultz, emeritus chairman of Starbucks, made clear that this new kind of capitalism is Both/And: “We wish to be an economic, intellectual and social asset in the communities where we operate,” he wrote in 2020. “We would do this not at the expense of profits, but to grow them.” [22]
Balancing and Navigating
For business leaders to move from a single, predominant goal to the new challenge of addressing six goals at the same time – delivering value, investing in employees, dealing ethically with suppliers, supporting the local communities, protecting the environment, and generating profits for shareholders – is not only an abrupt and dramatic shift from the classic Either/Or, to Both/And ” (and in this case to “Six/And”), it is an uncharted, in-between land for most leaders of business organizations. Fully aware of the challenges of confronting an altered landscape, BSG CEO Rich Lessor makes a case for balancing the demands and navigating the in-between space: “For CEO’s right now, the challenge is how does one convey a sense of community and humanity…when there is so much disgust and division. That’s the balance many of us are trying to navigate right now.” [23]
Struggling in The In-Between
While balancing the competing demands of Both/And goals, and navigating the space between competing demands, is difficult is all aspects of life – life choices, personal relationships, and organizational and business decisions – it is the political arena that offers us the most dramatic examples. In the weeks following the 2020 presidential elections, most of the nation was gripped by the question, “He lost. When will he admit it and leave?” For Vice-President Pence, the question went beyond politics and became personal. His dilemma was painfully clear: While it is widely believed that Pence plans to run for president in 2024, he can’t move until he learns what Mr. Trump is planning. A headline in The New York Times on November 12th, captured Pence’s dilemma: “Pence Tries to Balance His Loyalty to Trump Vs. His Own Political Path.” [24] For Pence, serious balancing and navigating is required.
Other politicians face similar challenges. Another headline in The New York Times two weeks after the election was decided reveals the dilemma of many Republican politicians: “Many G.O.P. Governors Avoid Stating Plainly That Biden Won,” it read. They seemed willing to admit it privately, but in the public arena they were faced with the complicating factor that most of their constituents voted for Trump, and Trump continued to insist that he had won the election. “Most were operating in the murky middle ground in which they neither gave full credence to the president’s claims of fraud nor affirmed Joe Biden’s victory.” [25]
Here are some other examples of people struggling in the “murky middle ground:”
Between a Rock and a Hard Place in Montana: On July 15, 2020, Steve Bullock, Governor of Montana issued a directive requiring face covering at indoor public spaces and at large public gatherings. Small business owners in Hamilton, Montana – Nicki Ramsier, owner of the River Rising Bakery, Randy Lint, owner of the Big Creek Coffee Roasters, and Shawn Wathen, co-owner of Chapter One Book store – were relieved. “The Governor’s order was supposed to handle [the mask problem] for us so that we could focus on staying open as a business, right”? added co-owner Mara Lynn Luther.
Wrong. The sheriff in Hamilton, backed up by the Ravalli County commissioners, chose not to enforce the order, saying individual rights took priority. “That decision left small business owners stuck in the middle of a monthslong national conflict over mask wearing,” wrote Amy Haimerl in The New York Times on October 23, 2020, “as they try to keep staff safe and their doors open without alienating customers.” But many customers were alienated. After Ms. Ramsier of the River Rising Bakery decided that her staff would wear masks, several customers berated them. One customer told a member of the staff that she was“bending the knee to tyranny.” The in-between dilemma with which the owners struggled was summarized by one of the owners of the bakery: “At one level, I feel like I should push for more masks,” he said. “But on the other side, I feel like, at what cost? For us to survive, we need everyone as customers.”
Michele DeGroot and her daughter, Marlena, owners of Big Sky Candy, made their decision. They took down the “masks required” sign and replaced it with this:
“BASICALLY
It’s up to you.
You do what you feel is right
for you. We will not judge you.
The rest of the world
does enough judging. We
don’t need that here. We love
each and every one of you.” [26]
Between “Truth” and “Truthiness:” The play, The Lifespan of a Fact, begins with an email projected on a scrim curtain from a magazine editor asking for a volunteer to fact-check a recently submitted, non-fiction article about a boy’s suicide in Las Vegas, and ends with the three characters in the play – John D’Agata, Jim Fingal and Emily Penrose – sitting on a couch facing the audience. Penrose, the editor is in the middle, Fingal, the fact-checker, on the left and D’Agata, the author, on the right. They look out at the audience, a mixture of frustration, resignation, and anger on their faces. The 90 minutes in between are filled with a titanic struggle between Fingal and D’Agata, managed and refereed by Penrose.
From a 15-page article submitted by the author, Jim, the fact-checker produced a 130-page spreadsheet containing hundreds of exaggerations, misstatement and what can only be called lies. John, the author of the essay, however, dismisses the concerns of the fact-checker. “I’m not interested in accuracy, “ he says, “I’m interested in truth,” What he means is not the “truth” as seen by the fact-checker, which has everything to do with accuracy, but what he refers to as a”higher truth” – the “music” and the meaning of the boy’s tragic death.
Here is an example of where they disagree: In the first sentence of the essay, the author mentions that there were, “thirty-four licensed strip clubs in Vegas.” When the fact-checker discovers that, in fact, there were only thirty-one, the author replies, “…the rhythm of ‘thirty-four’ works better in the sentence that ‘thirty-one,’ and so I changed it.”
And here is another: D’Agata writes that the boy “jumped from the tower of the Stratosphere Hotel at 6:01:43, hitting the ground at 6:01:52.” The fact-checker counters with different numbers. “According to the Coroner’s Report, Levi Presely’s fall supposedly took only eight seconds, not nine. So the actual time frame would be more like 6:01:43 – 6:01:51.” D’Agata response was “Yeah, I fudged that. I needed him to fall for nine seconds rather than eight in order to help make some of the later themes in the essay work.”
At the end of the play, the three characters, having spent the night struggling to decide which facts of the boy’s suicide they should accept and which they should reject, await the decision of the editor to publish the revised article or cut it. Their positions on the couch represent not only the issues of the play they struggled with, but also the realities of many of our struggles to make decisions: The fact-checker at one end who stands for a fact-based version of truth; the author at the other end who insists that what is important is creating a powerful story even if it means using literary and artistic freedoms to embellish and even modify the facts; and the editor in the middle, the problem solver, who has struggled all night in the “murky middle ground” of the wicked problem of trying to find an acceptable way forward between the two. [27]
Finding a Balance
URGENT! SUBTLE! CONCISE! ROBUST!
Words posted on a studio wall of artist Lucian Freud. [28]
A headline in the Washington Post on November 18 identified the problem: “Our covid-19 polarization will only get worse. We need to find a balance.” The story that followed was not about the recent spike in Covid-19 cases that the country is struggling with, but about the differences of opinions between two groups of people: those who insist that the only way forward is to increase the use of masking, hand washing, social distancing and, unless the curve begins to flatten out once again, closing down schools and businesses, and those who have decided not to follow these instructions and take their chances. “Most Americans who chafe at covid-19 restrictions understand science,” says the author of the article, Gary Abernathy, “but not everyone worships at its altar. They balance the science with other lived principles such as faith, family, and freedom.” The serious problem of the pandemic has, for a number of reasons, divided itself into two: A divide in the county between those who believe that urgent and wide-spread action is needed to stop the virus from spreading, and those who resist the idea of buckling under to restrictions imposed by governments. “The disagreements are heartfelt,” says Abernathy. “Finding a balance that everyone will accept will require respect and compromise – two things in short supply in the United States right now…”
Skilled Navigators
Most problems are singular in nature. We define a goal, make a plan to reach it. and then begin to organize, and mobilize in order to implement the plan. When two or more goals are involved, things become more complicated. Is one goal more important that the other? If we focus on one, is there a risk of losing sight of the other? Do we have people available who are experience and skillful in reaching both goals? What does it mean to be in the space in-between the two goals?
In these “In-between” territories, two words appear regularly: balance and naviatge. Earlier we quoted BCG’s CEO Rich Lessor’s rhetorical question: “the challenge is how do you convey a sense of community and humanity,” as well as make money, is a “…Balance many of us are trying to navigate right now.”
Between Patience and Pressure: In 1958, Fred Hills, a graduate student in English at Stanford, was browsing in a bookstore in San Francisco and came across a copy of Vladimir Nabokov’s novel, Lolita. He read the first sentence and, according to his obituary published on November on 20th in The New York Times, “was so electrified that he paid the full price of $5 for the book.” Hills always remembered that first encounter with Nabokov with great fondness. Later, astonishment was added in as Hill became Nabokov’s editor at Simon and Schuster, editing half-dozen of his books and Nobokov’s original screenplay for Lolita, which he reduced from nine hours to two. In 1974, Hills found himself in Zermatt working with Nabokov on his last novel, Look at the Harlequins and, during breaks, hunting butterflies with him in the foothills of the Alps. His admiration for Nabokov never waned. “Having worked with many other writers,” he said in 2019, “I believe that Nabokov was the most dazzling of them all.”
As an editor for several New York publishers, Hills had a remarkably successful career. During his four decades as an editor, he edited over 50 New York Times best sellers and once set a record by producing nine Times hardcover best sellers in one 12-month period.
His abilities in working with writers were legendary. “In Mr. Hills’ hands,” wrote Katharine Seelye in his obituary, “an author was safe from the scratching of a pointed red pencil and instead would be nudged by gentle persuasion.” His great talent, wrote author, Daniel Yergin, was his ability to find an “inimitable balance between patience and subtle pressure.” When trying to persuade others to move toward his suggestions, Hills’ ability to navigate the fine line between patience and pressure payed dividends for the publisher as well as the authors. [30]
A Rabbi Who Excelled with Both/And Decisions: Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, former chief rabbi of the United Kingdom and widely honored as an important voice on the role of religion in the modern world, died on November 10, 2020. Between 1991 and 2013 he was Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the United Kingdom, but his death was mourned not only by Jews, but world-wide by Muslims and Christians of all denominations as well.
While his religious home was Orthodox Judaism, his voice was inclusive. In The Dignity of Difference: How to Avoid the Clash of Civilizations, published in 2002, he wrote, “God has spoken to mankind in many languages: through Judaism to Jews, Christianity to Christians, Islam to Muslims. No one creed has a monopoly on spiritual truth.” He added, “God is greater than religion. He is only partially comprehended by any faith.” In a 2013 study of his work titled Universalizing Particularity, the editors commented upon his great ability to manage skillfully the space in between different positions and points-of-view: “Sacks possesses a rare ability to hold in delicate balance the universal demands of the multicultural world with the particularism associated with Judaism.” Holding in “delicate balance” two competing religious and intellectual perspectives is a rare ability, one worthy of praise and admiration. [31]
Between Black and White: In 1955, in the midst of the rising tensions of the Civil Rights Movement in the South, Robert S. Graetz accepted the position of minister of the Trinity Lutheran Church in Montgomery, Alabama, an event that attracted an unusual amount of attention because Graetz was a white man and all of the worshipers in the church were Black. The Ku Klux Klan also noticed, and threats, attacks and bombings soon followed. Reverend Graetz was undeterred. Shortly after his arrival, the Montgomery bus boycott began. Graetz would preach on Sundays that the members of his congregation should not ride the buses, and then during the week he would drive them to work, often modifying his driving routes to thwart attackers. As reported in the New York Times on September 22, 2020, he “toggled seamlessly between foot soldier and field general in civil rights and social justice causes for over seven decades.”
He was in contact danger. “If anything, a white person who was helping a Black person was seen [by the white community] as worse than the Black person.” In August, 1956, the parsonage was bombed, leaving a 15-inch-deep crater on the lawn.
Yet he never wavered. “We feel that God has given us the unique privilege of standing with one foot in the Black community and one foot in the white,” he wrote in A White Preacher’s Message on Race and Reconciliation, published in 2006. “It may not be comfortable, but that is where we are. And until God tells us it is time to slow down, we intend to to keep pressing ahead with our
witness.” [32]
Coming Back to Courage
“Courage is at the center.”
The Paradox Principles
We are united in a common cause: we want to live what we believe is a Good Life however we define it. In fact, the philosopher John Kekes insists that “Living a good life is the most important of all human activities because the importance of everything else derives from it.” And yet, he observes, that while everyone is trying to live a good life, “not everyone is good at it. Many lives are bad,” he continues, “because [it] is difficult and there are formidable obstacles.” [33]
Living a good life, then, comes down to “formidable obstacles,” to problems, many of which are wicked ones, and whether we have the courage to confront them. Living such a life depends upon how skillful and how willing we are at finding and overcoming the difficult problems that stand in our way. Many of these require little of us. Because we have the experience and resources to solve or fix them, we take them in stride, seeing them as little more than part of the routines of our everyday lives. Other problems, however, are not routine at all, and involve risks and even danger to our well-being. We often feel overwhelmed by them, and, at times, turning away to find another path can seem to be a better choice. Yet if we are to find our way to the Good Life that we seek, turning away is a bad decision. A better choice is to find the courage to walk up to the problems on the path in front of us and pitch into them as best we can.
“Pressing Ahead”
The dictionary’s definition of courage is “a quality of spirit that allows you to face courage or pain without showing fear.” Facing up to the evil of racism in Montgomery, Alabama Reverend Graetz “pressed ahead with his witness” regardless of the threats and the bombings. Was he afraid? Of course, and yet he wrote, “absence of fear is not the point…We often had good reason to be afraid…[but] what you do when you are afraid is what makes the difference.”
Philip Booth, the poet came at courage from a different perspective. Courage was what was required to “keep believing in love.”
Rabbi Jonathan’s Sack’s attempts to create a “delicate balance” between the expectations of the Orthodox Jewish community in the United Kingdom and the demands of the modern, multicultural world required courage. Some in the Jewish community accused him of heresy, and insinuated that he was not worthy of being their leader, yet Rabbi Sacks pressed ahead. “God has spoken to mankind in many languages,” he wrote in The Dignity of Difference. “Through Judaism to Jews, Christianity to Christians, Islam to Muslims. No one creed has a monopoly on spiritual truth; no one civilization encompasses all the spiritual, ethical and artistic expressions of mankind.” [34]
“Fly The Middle Course”
In Greek mythology, Daedalus, the creator of the Labyrinth for King Minos, ended up a prisoner of the king so he could not share the secrets of how he built it. He decided to escape by building wings of feathers and wax for himself and his son, Icarus, and fly out. As they launched themselves into the sky, Daedalus warned his son not to fly too high where the sun would melt the wax that held his wings in place, or too low where the sea spray would soak his feathers and weigh him down. “Fly the middle course,” instructed Daedalus. Once in the sky, however, Icarus ignored his father’s advice and abandoned the middle way. Soaring upward toward the sun, the heat melted the wax holding his wings in place, and he fell into the sea and drowned. [35]
Flying the middle course is almost always the more difficult choice, one that requires wisdom, discipline and courage, and yet for many of our most difficult and important problems, especially our wicked ones, it is the best one. No one will claim that life in the “messy middle” is simple, straightforward, or easy, but if we hope to make things better, it is where we must be. Learning to live there when we must, and flourish there when we can, is not only among our among our greatest challenges, but often turns out to be among our most important opportunities. Perhaps this is what Robert Frost meant when, in his narrative poem, “A Servant to Servant, he wrote, “…the best way out is always through.” [36]
Chapter Two Endnotes
1. Gary Abernathy, “Our covid-19 polarization will only get worse. We need to find a balance,” The Washington Post, November 18, 2020.
2. Dhruv Khullar, “The deadly cost of American pandemic politics.” The New Yorker, December 8, 2020.
3, H. Resit Akcakaya, in John Schwartz, “Georgina Mace, Who Shaped List of Endangered Species is Dead at 67.” The New York Times, December 2, 2020.
4. The Price Waterhouse Change Integration Team, The Paradox Principles: How High- Performing Companies Manage Chaos, Complexity, and Contradictions to Achieve Superior Results. Chicago: Irwin Professional Publishing, 1996, 5.
5. Quoted in Price Waterhouse, 5.
6. Price Waterhouse, 8.
7. Philip Booth,“Sixty-Three,” Pairs. New York: Penguin Books, 70.
8. Michael Marquardt, Leading with Questions: How Leaders Find the Right Solution by Knowing What to Ask. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2014, 139.
9. F. G. Bailey, The Tactical Uses of Passion. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1993, 34.
10. Alan Murray, The CEO Daily, Fortune, November 12, 2020.
11. Alan Murray, November 12, 2020.
12. Rosabeth Kanter, When Giants Learn to Dance. New York: Touchstone. 20-21.
13. Esther Cameron and Mike Green, Making Sense of Change Management. New York: Kogan Page Limited, 5th Ed. 2020, 3
14. Kanter, 20
15. Charles Handy, The Age of Paradox. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1994, 12.
16. Milton Friedman, “A Friedman Doctrine – The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits.” The New York Times, September 13, 1970.
17. “Analyse This,” The Economist, 31 March, 2016.
18. Joseph Bower and Lynn Paine, “The Error at the Heart of Corporate Leadership,” Harvard Business Review, 95 (3) 50-60, June, 201.
19. Tom Poldre, “The Friedman Doctrine at 50: Happy Birthday and R.I.P.” https://medium.com/reinventing-business/the-friedman-doctrine-at-50-happy-birthday-and R-I0P/
20. Business Roundtable, “Business Roundtable Redefines the Purpose of a Corporation to Promote ‘An Economy That Serves All Americans.” Business Roundtable, August 19, 2019. wwww.businessroundtable.org/business-roundtable-redefines-the -purpose-of- business-to-promote-‘An-economy-that-serves-all Americans’/
21. Marc Benioff, “A Free Market Manifesto That Changed the World, Reconsidered.” The New York Times, September 11, 2020.
22. Howard Schultz, The New York Times, September 11, 2020.
23. Alan Murray, CEO Daily, Fortune, November, 5, 2020.
24. Annie Karni and Michael S. Schmidt, “Pence Tries to Balance His Loyalty to Trump vs. Own Political Path.” The New York Times, November 12, 2020.
25. The New York Times, November 18, 2020.
26. Amy Haimal, “Mask Mandate? In a Montana Town, It’s Put Us at Odds with Customers.” The New York Times, October 19, 2020.
27. John D’Agata and Jim Finkle, The Lifespan of a Fact. New York: W. W. Norton, 2012. 16. 19. The play, The Lifespan of a Fact, by Jeremy Kareken, David Murrell and Gordon Farrell opened on Broadway on October 17, 2018.
28. Robert Hughes, Lucian Freud: Paintings. Revised Edition, Port Melbourne, Australia: Thames & Hudson, 1997. 22
29. Gary Abernathy, November 18, 2020
30. Katherine Q. Seeley, “Fred Hills, Editor of Nabokov and Many Others, Dies at 85.” The New York Times, November 21, 2020.
31. Ari L. Goldman, “Jonathan Sacks, 72, Chief Rabbi of the U. K. Who Promoted Including Dies.” The New York Times, November 10, 2020
32. Alan Blinder, “Robert S. Graetz, Rare White Minister to Back Bus Boycott, Is Dead at 92.”The NewYork Times, September 22, 2020.
33. John Kekes, The Art of Life. Ithaca, New York: The Cornell University Press, 2002. 3.
34. Jonathan Sacks, The New York Times, November 10, 2020.
35. “Daedalus and Icarus,” Wikipedia, “https://eb.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Daedalus&oldid=982469071, 8 October 2020.
36. Robert Frost, “A Servant of Servants,” Frost: Collected Poems, Prose, & Plays. New York:
Library of America. 1995. 65