Open Stories

There’s a soft chuckle sitting in the back of my throat while I’m reflecting on all the profoundly exotic ways I’ve been betrayed in my life. Yes, I mean to say exotic exactly because there’s no way to describe the ludicrous circumstances that made it all possible.

After the shock and the pain wear off, I get preachy. Deservedly so. Anyone who’s stabbed in the back has the unmitigated right to pop off, and in many cases, I’m glad I did. I could close doors that I have no desire to open again. That chapter is over, and I can move on without feeling like I’ve left something on the table.

Then there are other kinds of betrayal where the pain doesn’t wear off, it wears into softness. Where nothing needs to be said. It’s a knife in the heart that let’s me see myself and the other person more clearly, more acutely. It heals another wound I didn’t even know I had. I’m led into easeful forgiveness, and I can let the Holy Spirit write the last line. Those are chapters that still left to be written.

In life and in leadership, there will be betrayal. You can’t always leave doors open, and yet, life will absolutely remind you that you certainly can’t always be the one close them either. Some things aren’t up to you. You will be asked to find a balance between forgiveness and adjudication, vindication and reconciliation.

Where there is hard-headed pride, allow yourself to shut the door, close the chapter. Where there is accountability and a commitment to correction, allow yourself and others to find a way back into right alignment.

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