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R-E-S-P-E-C-T

The “Queen of Soul,” Aretha Franklin, made it clear in her hit song. “All I am askin’ is for a little respect.” When I first came to Brooklyn, I thought a lot about fitting in, learning the culture, speaking the lingo, and connecting with folks. As a White boy from the Midwest, I spent a lot of time thinking about how this would all work out. It didn’t seem quite right that I was coming in new and put in charge of a team of 20+ staff. I will never forget the moment I was introduced to the after-school staff at PS7, an amazing team caring for 300 elementary students after school. I don’t remember what I said but I remember how I felt, full of awe and respect for this talented crew and amazed at those fabulous 300 kids.


Thankfully someone had given me an important paradigm. They said that you don’t earn respect by being like someone, you earn respect by giving respect. I have tried to hold on to that perspective ever since. I think it has led to a fruitful partnership with hundreds of staff and young people. This respect paradigm says that my job as a supervisor is to do what it takes to help them fully exercise their talents and accomplish the mission that brought us together.


I have seen this at dicey times too. Respect is even more important when tempers flair. Frustrated young people in our jobs programs, upset businesses in our kitchen, disgruntled staff in active conflict with each other —- you name it — everyone just needs a little respect. Respect is a powerful, universal language.  You can see the angst visibly drain from a person; the tenseness in their muscles dissipates the minute you make it clear that you genuinely respect them. And this is not a patronizing gesture.  It is not a “yes, but . . .”  It's what you do when you really believe that each person has a lot of really good reasons for feeling and believing the way they do — so many reasons in fact, that if I had those same reasons, I would most likely feel the way they do.

This paradigm doesn’t cost a thing. It just has to be real.  You just have to actually believe it, you have to believe that what they are feeling or thinking is a logical conclusion to myriads of important circumstances. That generational wisdom, those fine-tuned resiliency skills, and survival strategies have worked over centuries and were often curated in the fires of injustice. Who am I to ever downplay such feelings or perspectives?


Sometimes we Christians dismiss things we don’t understand as sin. We might just say that someone is being selfish or not self-controled when we don't really understand what is going on. I think the better path is to just say, "I don't understand, but I respect you enough to ask you to help me understand." Respect comes first. That’s the baseline. The Gospel acknowledges “what is” before entertaining “what could be.”  


Folks overlooked a lot in me as I bumbled my way into life in Brooklyn. What I learned is that if you are generally curious, it goes a long way. 


This was the first crack that started to let the light into the ethno-centric assumptions, that I didn't even know I had. Like a tree growing out of bedrock, the good life was just getting started.


Occasionally, it comes full circle. The other day I was chatting with a newly promoted dean at a NYC public school. I barely know her, but her warm smile and bright eyes told me there was some kind of connection. In the way someone talks about fond memories from a lifetime ago, she recounted that she had been one of those 300 kids at PS 7 when I first came to Brooklyn. In that moment I knew that RESPECT was the only way to feel toward her back then, and it hasn’t changed a bit these 20 years later.


“Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.” Philippians 2:4

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About Me

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This is me and my wife, Linda. I'm from Canada, but its been 40 years since as a little boy, I had a dream to live in a big city,  Now I am livin' the dream in the biggest city around, NYC.

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