Sometimes we can learn a lot from sitting and observing the world. But, don’t observe too long. Our minds have a great way of creating a lot of thoughts when we observe. Some of those thoughts may be incorrect while others prevent us from engaging with those around us in ways that mutually benefit. Step out of your costume and take off the mask once in a while and see what happens.
Episode 14 Show Notes
- A Tiger Called Tomas – https://amzn.to/2BF7amr
- All I Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten – https://amzn.to/2We7ySz
Episode 14 Script
This is Rebecca Clark. Episode 14 Hiding this’ll Podcast is for anyone that knows they haven’t yet found and offered up their best work but are compelled to seek it out and do it. Are you ready to move? I’m recording this around Halloween, and I’ve never been a huge Halloween fan partially from my upbringing. And then I never decided to work on any of the thoughts I had about Halloween that came from my upbringing. My parents would often have us just go out the back door and come to the front door when we were really little and do trick or treat. And then when we got older, we did not go very far in the neighborhood because my parents weren’t big fans of us kind of begging for candy. Yes, I thought it was. And when people came to our house, I think it was pretty fun for most of them because they were expected to do some kind of trick to get a treat, and so could they could tell a joke. They could come in and play the piano, or they could just share something from themselves to get a treat. Now that might seem extreme to some, but a lot of people had a lot of fun with that over the years and would prepare to bring some kind of trick. And, of course, there’s parties and trunk retreats and all these things going on at this time of year, and I’m kind of warming up to the idea of Halloween as I have a tiny person that hears about it at school and wants to be part of it. And he, ironically, likes the process of getting the candy, but then doesn’t have very much interested in. So we’re going to let that belief stay for as long as it can, right? I’m gonna have a couple of episodes where Halloween is in the episode to share a point, Ah, thought or to highlight a person. And today I wanted to talk about hiding, and Halloween is the perfect time to talk about hiding because people are in costume there, purposely trying to become a different identity or hide themselves in this new identity in some way. And there’s this great little book. Once again, I’d never heard about it, called a Tiger called Tomas My Charlotte Zola toe, and it’s for kids. But of course they’re all for adults, too. And this little boy named Tomas has moved into a new neighborhood, and he’s a very nice boy. But when he moved, he got it into his head that the people might not like him, and so he never leaves his front porch. He just sits there and is always observing the neighborhood, So he sees this little girl playing hopscotch. She sees this older man walking his poodle. He sees a woman trimming her flowers. And for each of these people, his mother asked, You know, why don’t you play with, um, Why don’t you talk to them? And he said, Well, maybe they won’t like me and his mother’s always saying, Well, of course they’ll like you. Why wouldn’t they? And then she keeps asking Por que? No, She is speaking to him in both English and Spanish in this book, and he doesn’t answer his mother when she asks Por que no, which is why not. He just sits there and continues tow watch, and he keeps assuming that none of these people will like him. His mother must be worrying about this somewhat because she asks him this question for each person in the neighborhood that walks by or that she sees out the window. And each time he says, you know, he feels like they won’t like him, and Thomas just sits there on the steps and watches this all happen. But on Halloween, his mother takes an action. She goes and purchases him a costume and just says, Try this on and I’m assuming he’s a little boy. So he’s excited to see what this costume is and how it will look on him. And he asked his mom how he looks and she said, exactly like a Tigre because it’s a tiger costume and he looks in the mirror and he has his mask on. And he’s pretty proud because, he says, no one will know who I am when I go trick or treating. So for some reason, he still wants to have this barrier between him and the people in the neighborhood before it’s the steps, and now the costume provides a barrier. At the same time, it shows that he still wants to go trick or treat. He wants to take some kind of step Tyner act with people, and she goes trick or treating, and it’s really interesting. The book kind of goes through each person that’s already introduced prior to this, like the little girl playing hopscotch and the man with his poodle and this wound cutting her flowers. He is shocked when they’re so nice to him, and then they’ll say, You know, when he says Thank you Well, you’re welcome, Tomas And he blush is under his mask because like, Wow, that’s funny. She called the Tiger Tomas right? So he hasn’t figured out that they know he’s Tomas. He just assumed she’s given this tiger name. But then it happens that the next door where the woman offers, you know the daughter wants to play with them. She’s not there. She’s tricker treating, but that he can come over the next day and interact with her. And, you know, come on by and play Tomas. So now he hears us again, and he’s starting to realize he’s not hiding enough. It’s they know who’s under this mask, and then this tall ghost goes by him, and this is a tall boy. He’s seen playing in the neighborhood, and he felt something familiar about him. But he wasn’t sure. And the ghost says, Hi, Tomas, want to play horseshoes tomorrow? And of course, at this point, Tomas just automatically says Sure, And then he realizes who the ghost is he for sure. He recognizes that it’s the boy, and the next person’s, you know, gives him some fresh baked pumpkin cookies and addresses him as Tomas. And the last person he visits says, You know, the cat is lonely, you can come play with him. Tomas and Tomas said he was lonely, too, and he’s expressing surprise at each place that each person knows who he is, even when he’s going home. This little girl, dressed up as a witch says, Hi, Tomas, And so he gets home and he walks into his room and he looks in the mirror and he sees a Tigre in the mirror looking at him. And, of course, his mom’s there to check on him to see how he’s doing. And he wants to know how they knew who he Waas and his mom acts surprised. I’m assuming and said, Did they really and said Yes, the mask didn’t fool them a bit, and they all asked me to come back and she said, I guess they all like you and he felt wonderful. Battalions. The book, he felt wonderful. And this book, I had a lot of thoughts about it, how we act in our personal lives, in our work lives. There’s some of us that like to hide. I know I like to hide. I just want to get some work done. I told you know, the more I have to interact the more I feel like I’m not getting work done and that’s not true. We’re actually getting more work done when we work together and we don’t try to hide. But what I think is interesting is that Tomas is sitting there, and he’s so great it observing everything. Hey, sitting out there on the front porch, he is taking it all in. But while he’s observing, he also has a lot of time to think and is thinking isn’t all the way useful for him because he is creating all of these assumptions while he’s sitting there thinking about why people don’t like him, why they wouldn’t want to spend time with him. What will happen when he goes off his front porch toe, ask for help or to play for Interact in any way. And so he’s building all of this up, and it’s actually becoming harder for him to step away from the porch, simultaneous to him, sitting there on the porch. Every single person he’s observing is observing him Now. He’s making it pretty easy because he’s in the same spot. An object at rest stays at rest. But they are also starting to make certain assumptions about this little boy sitting out on the front porch. And some of those assumptions may be true. Or they may not be. Either way, those thoughts start to increase, perhaps as they see him make this choice over and over again. So everybody’s just staring at each other, But some happen to be hopscotching. Some happen to be taking their dogs for a walk, and some happen to be cutting their flowers. What I think is so interesting is that the person sitting on the step is sitting there observing a lot and having a lot of thoughts and assumptions. But so are the people that are out doing things about the person on the step, and somehow they’re not finding a way to get to each other, even though they’re all in the same neighborhood. So they’re occupying similar spaces and somehow cannot break through. So here enters the mother who takes this tiny action that’s completely normal to do at that time of year. Apparently, it’s Halloween. He needs a costume in her mind. She goat gets him a costume and just asks him to put it on. Now he’s obviously not sitting on the front step. At this point, he happens to be up in his bedroom, trying this costume on, and he’s kind of relieved, and he expresses that he’s so happy, You know, that no one will know who he is because he has this tiger costume on with this mask. And yet you get a sense that he really does want to go trick or treating that he really does want to interact with these people. But all of these assumptions and thoughts have built up in his mind that have made him decide not to take action. And somehow this costume seems to give him this little push, this little nudge to God in the neighborhood because no one will really know who it is. And as he goes to each house, you know to have them not only know who he is, but regardless of what assumptions they’ve had in their mind and their thoughts, it’s clear that they have wanted to interact with him, too, and perhaps did not know how to go interact with him. And him, arriving at their front door to trick or treat opens the door at the first door. You know, I think he’s still a little caught off guard like Wait a second. Did they call the tiger Tomas? Because Tomas is like a famous tiger Or do they know who I am? And then he realizes they really do know who he is. Not only do they know who he is, but they’re excited to interact with him and there, actively inviting him to interact with them that next day. So they’re in the same circumstance. They’re on the same street in the same house, is doing some of the same things, except one little thing changed. Someone took action in this case. It was the mother. But then tell Moss took the next action to go trick or treat. Each door and each door someone felt like Tomas taking a step toward them, allow them to then take a step toward him, and then they can start this mutually beneficial relationship. There are a lot of layers to this, as always. Anytime there’s hiding involved, right, there’s there’s a few layers to get found and one of the concepts I’m gonna talk about laters a sequence of nudges that can occur. It’s just another reminder that as we are actively observing the world, we’re going to have lots of thoughts and in those thoughts were going to make assumptions. And if we’re not careful, we can sit there being so busy and our observations and our assumptions and all of these thoughts that we might not end up engaging invaluable conversations and knowledge sharing and ideas that could only happen if everyone takes a little bit of step out of hiding a little step to share, thought, to try to connect. And in the process, I believe that we’ll also find out that some of our assumptions were flawed. The perhaps we’re making those assumptions from a place of a little bit too much observation analysis and not enough interactive engagement. This also reminds me of a story and it’s toward the back of the book. All I need to know I learned in kindergarten and it’s the get found story about the children that are playing hide and seek. And he’s talking about someone that hid too well so no one could find him and how it’s probably better to engage in a game of sardines because in sardines, when you find someone, you hide with them and work with them. And he also shares a story. I think it’s Robert Fulghum is the author shares a story about how sometimes when we’re going through problems or going through difficult times in life we can hide and how hiding is not the best thing to do. He shared the story about someone had cancer and decided not to tell their friends so that he wouldn’t hurt. And it hurts them. Maur that the cancer survivor didn’t tell them because they wanted to step in and have more experiences with that person before they passed away. But that person decided to hide instead of share what they’re going through. They made all these assumptions about hurting others around them when really the others were completely open and anxious to participate in this person’s life and to make more memories. So as usual, I enjoy learning and growing from different resource is, and children’s books continue to be an excellent source of information and thought provoking material. So enjoy this Halloween season. Enjoy creating your costume and wearing it and going out and meeting others as you trick or treat. But remember, there’s a time and a place to hide under the costume, and there’s a time and a place to get found. Talk. Thank you for listening to another episode of the move Your best show. 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