Lessons from a Snowball to the Face

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 20:38:00 -0500
personal-stories

When I was 6 or 7 years old, my family spent a weekend at Big Bear Lake, about 120 miles from our home in suburban Los Angeles. It was the middle of winter, and the trip was one of one of those we warm climate-dwellers would describe as "going to the snow." My aunt and uncle's family made the trip as well, and I spent a lot of time with my cousins playing in all that strange, cold, white stuff on the ground.

At one point my uncle playfully threw a snowball at me, not realizing it contained a chunk of ice. The blow split my lip, and I started to bleed, and to cry like crazy. As we trudged back to our lodge for some disinfectant and a bandage, my uncle said, "David, I'm very impressed with how you're handling this. If it were [his daughter, my cousin], she'd be doing a lot more yelling and crying."

I stopped crying instantly, and my mind began to turn over the idea that I could show bravery by holding back my tears, and that this was (apparently) a good thing.

Obviously I wasn't the only male child being taught that lesson, and my uncle's undoubtedly well-meaning comment was far from its only source in my life. My later tendency as a young adult to suppress negative emotions, which led to bouts of anxiety and depression, could hardly be traced back to one grown-up's encouraging remark on a snow-covered mountain.

But over the years, when I've occasionally replayed the scene in my mind, I've reflected on the power of positive feedback from an authoritative source. To the extent that I was already brave, I wanted only to be more so. And to the extent that I suspected I was not brave at all, and experienced my uncle's remark as an undeserved compliment, I wanted only to avoid the humiliation of failing to live up to his expectation.

In my role at UMBC I'm in a position to provide encouraging feedback a lot, and the snowball incident contributes to the sense of responsibility I feel whenever I do. I want to help people recognize what is most favorable and true about themselves. But I never want to distort their sense of themselves, or make them feel beholden to me, by suggesting that they need to fulfill my expectation about their reactions and behavior.