Emerson Trust 30 Challenge: Do What I Am Afraid To Do.

After a sabbatical from the Emerson Trust 30 Challenge, I find my self back in the box, so to speak. As I said in my post, "An Apology", life got in the way of confronting life. Frankly, I wouldn't have it any other way.

Prompt 9 from Mary Jaksch is about confronting that which I am afraid to do, or in this case, write about a topic that I would choose to not write about.

I could blog about bungee jumping or mountain climbing because I would never do either. I remember a former manager of mine saying, "There's a place where it's $99 for 2 bungee jumps." I replied, "Hell, I might jump twice to make $99." He told me, "No, it costs only $99 to jump twice". My response, "You pay to jump off a bridge with a big rubber band tied to your feet? Why would you do that?". He shook his head and walked away. Anyway, it's too simple to write about my fear of doing something corporal that I would indeed never do. There is no personal challenge in that.

I am most afraid of disappointing my family. Make that my wife and kids and marginally my mother. My mother was higher up on the list until I had a wife and kids. It's not that other family member don't matter but in fact other family members don't matter. I wouldn't go out of my way to make them angry, but if any family member other than my wife or kids are disappointed, oh well. In fact, outside of my wife and kids, others are unimportant.

My fear of disappointing wife and kids derives from my near 3 year period of unemployment. My plans are to open a service business to provide personalized life cycle celebrations, serving the secular/unaffiliated community. Failure or failing to bridge into other income producing areas could send everything into hell in a hand basket. My marriage is strong and house still owned but failure could cost both. Living in a box on the street is only marginally better than being dead on the street.  It would create the memories I would never want my kids to have. I'm sure all of us would survive the ordeal and sores would heal. Still, healed sores come with scars that are a constant reminder of the wound. Energy is a limited resource and I fear that I simply don't have the energy to invest in repairing the damage caused by homelessness and divorce. In that light, here's to success in all my future ventures.

ROL: The Truth

ROL is an abbreviation of the words Return on Life. ROL is the "live a fuller life" counterpart of the financial measure ROI. The concept of ROL is to make small, simple, incremental life changes that have to potential to pay off big time. This week's ROL is about telling the truth.
When it comes to the people you love, telling the truth is not an option. With those you love, the truth is the ONLY option. For those that think telling the truth may not always be simple. In response, let's take a look at a current news story:  Sen. John Ensign resigns his seat in mid-April before the results of a Senate ethics committee investigation were released.

BACKGROUND

Sen. Ensign (a married man) had an affair with Cynthia Hampton. Ms. Hampton worked for Senator Ensign's campaign and her husband was a staff member for Senator Ensign. The Hampton family was dependent solely on Senator Ensign for their livelihood. During the affair, Sen. Ensign listed Ms. Hampton as Aunt Judy on his cell phone. Sen. Ensign also set up email to connect with Ms. Hampton, as opposed to using his Senate account. Ms. Hampton wanted to end the affair. Senator Ensign did not want to end the affair. Ms. Hampton did not want her family to lose it's only source of income, (which included housing and private school tuition), therefore she continued the affair. Given his position as her de facto employer, it could be concluded that the coercive nature of the relationship constitutes sexual harassment in the workplace. Were this the only law broken it would be a very sad story. The harassment is only the tip of the iceberg.

Both Mr. Hampton and Mrs. Ensign learned of the affair.  Mr. Hampton quit his position on Ensign's staff and Mrs. Ensign had Cynthia Hampton fired. Mr. Hampton wanted significant restitution(it is illegal to pay severance to campaign staff). Sen. Tom Coburn became involved in smoothing things over for Sen. Ensign. Sen. Ensign's stepfather and mother paid $96,000 to Ms. Hampton. Mr. Hampton received a job with a lobbying firm(it is illegal for a former staffer to lobby their employer for a year).

THE SAGA CONTINUES

Sen. Ensign denied the payments from his parents were severance and had his parents sign two prepared affidavits that stated the $96,000 was one of many gifts given to the Hamptons. Sen. Ensign had documents about the affair destroyed. Sen. Coburn stated that his conversations with Sen. Ensign were privileged based on Sen. Coburn being a licensed physician and a church deacon. Sen. Ensign steered clients to Mr. Hampton.
Mr. Hampton lobbied Sen. Ensign's office within the prohibited time period.

THE AFTERMATH

Mr. Hampton is indicted for violating federal statute for lobbying a former employer during the disallowed time frame. Cynthia Hampton has filed for divorce and bankruptcy. The Senate Ethics Committee report is released. The results have been forwarded to the US Dept. of Justice for possible criminal prosecution. It is possible that Sen. Ensign's parents and Senator Coburn will be investigated for violating federal law.

THE MORAL

The moral is not about extra marital affairs. They happen and everyone has their own opinion about affairs. The moral neither indicts nor exonerates Sen. Ensign or Ms. Hampton for their choice of extracurricular activity. The moral goes back to telling the truth.

I can't imagine it's easy or fun to tell your spouse you are having sex with someoone else. I expect in most cases it would be an uncomfortable and messy scene. The truth might even lead to divorce, but look at Senator Ensign. The cover up of the lie has also led to divorce: and bankruptcy, ethics investigations, indictments, possibly prison and the end of a career in public service. 

The moral is the truth might not be simple, convenient or fun. 

Still, compared to any other option, the truth is about as simple as it gets.

  

Speaking of simple things with great returns, check out "It Starts With Us". Each week you get a 15 minute mission via email. When you're done, you share your thoughts with others in the group's forum. This week's mission is microvolunteering via Sparked.com. I helped a non-prof with their mission statement. Adding to "A Life Well Lived", 15 minutes a week. It can't get any simpler.