It Takes Both Ends to Hold a Rope Steady

Finding and maintaining balance—and optimism.

Someone shared a quote with me recently, and it hit hard—the way a quote does when you feel it so intrinsically. But where does that feeling come from? We don’t all just pop out of the womb vigorously nodding our heads in agreement with one another. I want to share with you my thought process here—how I connected the dots, and why this metaphor about a rope meant so very much to me.

Where it started…

A discussion around mini skirts—good idea, or bad idea? We lean on our principles to help interpret these trends for ourselves. We run through various points and connect our dots to help us think critically whether this is a notion that we’ll adopt, or if we’ll stand by as others experiment. Sometimes, upon further inspection, we might even give it a test run. Or maybe not.

Where it is now…

With each lived day, it becomes clearer and clearer that these discussions that take place ostensibly around whether a piece of clothing resonates with us, actually mirrors the process that we experience in life. I’m not implying that a mini skirt applies to each of our lives—but rather the way we consider new ideas—whether to adopt them, observe them, or let them pass us by.

I can’t help but think, though, how differently each of us applies (or doesn’t apply) this kind of critical thinking to the decisions and discussions that we encounter every day. In our work lives, and in our personal lives. And this is where I get super nerdy and intrigued:

Is each generation pre-programmed to connect these dots differently?

There’s a phrase that I’ve shared a few times on Insider Report, and it’s that people have always been people. It helps me recalibrate my thinking and correct my perspective if I find myself leaning too hard in one direction—and lately I’ve found myself thinking about this sentiment in relation to my generation: Gen Z. Honestly, we catch a lot of flak—and I’m not going to die on the hill of saying that we don’t warrant the criticism that we so often receive. It’s silly to make sweeping generalizations, but broadly speaking, we’re chronically online, frighteningly entitled, and anti-social (I said broadly speaking, okay? I know this doesn’t apply to everyone in my age bracket). But yet—haven’t people always been people? Hasn’t every generation had their own coming-of-age challenges and accompanying stereotypes? Yes, I might be addicted to my phone…but don’t we all know a grandmother that—literally as I type this—is forwarding us Facebook videos of porch thieves getting glitter bombed?

This did make me curious, though—I needed to dig deeper. Given that I only have 26 years of life experience, I had to turn to outside sources to help me frame this up:

• Baby Boomers ~1946-1964

  • Self-centered or narcissistic (“Me” generation)

  • Anti-authority in youth (hippies, counterculture), but conservative later in adulthood

  • Resistant to technological change

  • Blamed by younger generations for economic problems and environmental damage

  • Loyal, work-centric, but sometimes slow to adapt to new ideas

• Generation X ~1965-1980

  • Cynical, disaffected, slackers

  • Independent, skeptical of institutions

  • Less loyal to employers; more value placed on work-life balance

  • Sometimes seen as being forgotten (“Middle Child” generation)

  • Tech-competent but not digital natives

• Millennials ~1981-1996

  • Entitled, over-praised (“Participation Trophy” generation)

  • Narcissistic, sensitive, easily offended

  • Tech-savvy, but addicted to social media and validation

  • Delayed adulthood (later marriage, homeownership, etc.)

  • Idealistic, seeking meaning in work rather than just a paycheck

• Gen Z ~1997-2012

  • Hyper-connected, glued to their phones

  • Short attention spans, multitaskers (especially on social media)

  • Socially conscious, progressive, highly aware of diversity and identity issues

  • Often described as anxious, stressed (“Mental Health” generation)

  • Less traditional ambition; more value placed on work-life balance and authenticity

Looking at this list, I have to imagine that the generations that came before scoffed at the behaviors of their youth, and the younger generations likely felt grossly misunderstood by their elders. And because people have always been people, I’m positive that each generation experienced conflict and division amongst themselves. And though it’s easy to feel like the past is so far away, and like the people that came before us would never understand what it’s like to be a person today, these are not new or foreign concepts and experiences. Unless you’ve found the fountain of youth (you haven’t), we’re all experiencing varying stages of personhood for ourselves, for the very first time. That said, these stereotypes and behaviors don’t spontaneously form out of thin air. It’s understanding these behaviors that just might be the key to breaking out of them to become better communicators, and ultimately, better critical thinkers.

So, I want to share something that our President, Elaine, said to me recently that struck me to my core. It began with me popping my head into her office (as I often do) to quickly chat through some priority items on my to-do list. Our conversation quickly morphed into a rapid-fire game of current events ping-pong (as it often does). My conversations with Elaine are some of my favorites; I always leave feeling extremely energized, challenged, informed, and optimistic. She’s known me since I was 21 years old, and has seen me through many stages of life—both professionally and personally. These themes have a natural way of weaving themselves into our discussions. We swap anecdotes back and forth, and they provide rich context to help us connect the dots—pulling from our collective pool of experiences to help us problem-solve—from one generation to another.

As someone who doesn’t have an innate craving for work/life balance (whatever this looks like, or if it even exists), I wouldn’t have it any other way. My professional and personal lives are so enmeshed with one another that even if for a minute I wanted to separate them, I don’t know if I could. They share too many arteries to flourish without one or the other—they enrich one another, and feed both who I am inside and outside of the office. The connectivity between what I believe and who I am in both facets of my life helps me to be a better employee, and honestly, a better person.

At one point in our conversation, we wound up talking about how critical it is to be able to maintain composure and a clear mind when conversing with people whose thoughts, perspectives, opinions, and principles vary from our own. Debates, discourse, whatever you want to call it. This concept applies to a multitude of life scenarios, and as a young person practicing productive discourse in the present age, this sometimes feels like a lost art among my peers—out of reach, wishful thinking, a relic from the past before things felt so…complicated. But the truth is, things have always felt complicated. They felt complicated to my parents, to my parents’ parents, and so on. But we simply have to learn how to coexist—and dare I say, be compatible with—friction.

When I expressed this feeling—the urge to retreat and bite my tongue rather than to engage—Elaine said to me, “It takes both ends to hold a rope steady. We need both sides of a perspective to maintain healthy tension. What happens when one side lets go of the rope? It unravels.”

In this moment, it became clear to me that there isn’t just one rope, but two: the external rope that we hold with those around us, and the internal rope that exists within ourselves. And we have to understand and secure the rope within ourselves before holding our end of the rope with others.

Think about it this way: when you’re getting dressed, and you put on an outfit that feels remarkably one-dimensional, how do you feel? If you’re a Creative Pragmatist, I think it’s safe to say that you feel…well…one-dimensional. Flat. Lacking nuance, depth, point of view. You completely let go of the tension, and now your rope is floppy and lifeless. That tug within your chest that’s craving more—that’s friction. You’re craving friction! Now, the solve isn’t to scrap everything in your closet and find the craziest, clashing pieces and force them to work together—that would just be chaos. The rope need not be pulled so tightly that it snaps. Instead, maybe it’s that the tailoring of your trousers is quite interesting, causing you to do a double-take when you catch your reflection in the mirror, because the shape of the leg looks different at every angle? Your mind works the same way—when you allow yourself to be open to discourse, or friction, your firm beliefs and guiding principles keep you grounded, but the rug certainly won’t yank out from underneath your feet if someone thinks differently from you. Or, if you change your mind. Which you’re fully allowed to do, by the way.

In this same way, if you’re at a dinner party and you’re surrounded by people who look, talk, live, and act exactly like you, what will the conversation be like? Sure you probably have plenty of things in common to talk about, but how many times can you say, “Oh yes, I love that, too,” before you begin to crave some ruffled feathers or contrary opinions? If all the hands are tugging on the same side of the rope with no opposing force, what happens then? You all fall down.

I think by now you probably understand what this means in theory, but what does it look like in practice? While I don’t subscribe to every stereotype about my generation, I will admit to the allegations that we’re extremely socially conscious, and incredibly anxious. Are we so anxious because we’re so socially conscious, or vice versa? What came first, the chicken or the egg? I don’t have all the answers. But what I do know to be true is that whether it’s in your clothing, your career, or your relationships, maintaining the tension of your rope is a good thing. Pulling a bit tighter on one end or the other—a healthy push-and-pull that keeps you curious. When you feel a tug, hone in on what those forces are. But don’t drop the rope.