#have you ever asked for a traumatized fostered teenager to relate their life stories for a study?

[partangel]

me 🤝 symbolically adopting the foster teens who participate in my study by coming just to chat with them outside foster home

[letterboxd]

Debra Granik Q&A.

“I’m trying to make small films. I’m not trying to create stars. I’m trying to create roles where women don’t have to take off their clothes to be interesting.”

Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie (as Tom) with Debra Granik on the set of Leave No Trace.

Following her 2010 sleeper hit Winter’s Bone, Debra Granik’s newest film Leave No Trace follows a father and daughter who have been living undetected on public land until their presence is noticed and the authorities step in.

Based on Peter Rock’s novel My Abandonment (itself inspired by a real-life event), Ben Foster plays Will, a former soldier living off the grid with post-traumatic stress disorder, while Kiwi newcomer Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie is his teenage daughter, Tom, through whose perspective the story unfolds.

Letterboxd sat down with Granik in New York City to talk about filming in the forests of the Pacific Northwest, the challenge of filming an invisible condition (PTSD) and how she weathered the pressure of finding another Jennifer Lawrence. We also asked her to tell us about the films that she returns to again and again because they feed something in her—that list is here.

How are you feeling about the response to Leave No Trace so far? The audience we watched it with at BAM Cinemafest was captivated.

Oh, thank you. The bedrock is relief, because you can’t predict how a film can be received or understood or enjoyed. Nothing can ever predict that. What I really love is that some of the themes are being discussed. I really like that. I love that when it’s engendered by other people’s films, so of course it makes me excited to be part of storytelling tradition that would facilitate that. And I also really like that, because it’s regional, it exposes some of the glory of a particular part of the continent, and that people can appreciate it and look into it.

Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie (Tom) and Ben Foster (Will).

The film is deeply immersive in its nature setting. There are ways of filming that are certainly good-looking, and then there are ways of filming nature where you feel you’re actually in that forest, and that’s what you and your DP Michael McDonough have done. Some of our Letterboxd members (Melissa, MasterLundy) wanted to know why you’re so drawn to filming in a rustic setting, in nature rather than in cities, and how you approach that in terms of your filming.

I think maybe it even surprises me! I think one logistical reason is that it is actually easier to film outside of a city, you know? I mean just in terms of garnering your resources and keeping a small footprint… though I’m excited by the photography of the metropolis and will endeavor at some point to do something like that. In fact, in my first film, it was just interesting seeing them come into the city. It was a big deal, you know, sort of the bridge and tunnel experience was very photogenic in some ways.

I love the idea that when you film outside of a big city you can actually almost take your time more, in some ways. And I think the immersion is very related to some of the comfort that the actors can feel with Michael; that he’s willing to wear knee-pads and crouch down and be part of that inner circle of connection. Near a tent, near the fire-pit, or when they’re ministering to each other. And when that happens you feel a sense that you’ve been allowed to come close and that you’re with them.

And then of course to show the splendour and scope of the forest, stepping back and using the cinema tools that allow that: a wider lens, and the tripod, and stabilizing, and allowing the frame to be as big as possible.

So I think that outdoor spaces allow for that, whereas the indoor space is the box and the confinement and the geometry. It is much more established and familiar.

It’s cool to hear what Michael was doing physically. Quite often a camera is a long way away with a certain lens but in this case it felt, watching, that there were three characters—Will, Tom, and the camera.

At times, for sure, because the scenes were quiet. Coming in close, being very quiet about it. When we do those things we’re not using lights in the forest, we’re using all natural light, so maybe that’s also a really big help. You know, we’re reflecting things gently, we’re shielding certain hot spots but it’s done with flags and silks and bounce cards, not with big lights.

You’re not bringing in huge 6000Ks to the forest?

No, no!

Director of Photography Michael McDonough with Debra Granik.

You filmed the unfilmable in a way, which is PTSD. These types of mental health conditions, which we can’t see, rely so much on character rather than action. Why was the notion of filming this condition so interesting and important to you and what have you learned about it along the way?

I was very influenced by a book called The Evil Hours by David J. Morris, that is a chronicle by a marine—who is also a journalist—who put such specific words to what it was like to try to understand what was happening inside him and inside other men. And he also was informed very much by a woman, because another very significant sector or arena of PTSD is through sexual violence.

So, he looked back in history to how other philosophers and people in the medical and ‘helping’ professions had tried to understand it, and he looked really specifically at WWI and the poets of the UK who were able to put words to it. And then a couple of really humane doctors who were then the receivers of their words and it really opened the doctors’ minds because the poets could put such precision to it.

And so he looks at this almost miraculous time of gentle understanding and almost posits ‘can we have that now? Could we understand these ways? Could we replicate some of the things that were done in the British VA [Veterans’ Affairs] system after WWI?’, you know?

But the only way to get at this—I resonate with your point so much—is to try to extrude what is it that makes this particular person [Will] not want to come back in. What is he trying to stabilize and how is he doing it? He’s trying to find an environment in which there are very few triggers for him, where his hyper-vigilance is maintained at a kind of even keel, and where he’s very selectively choosing the things that he can still have faith in, that he can still admire and love on, which would be the elements of the forest, and his very loyal companion, his daughter. And to strip away that which clogs his system or causes such jitters that he doesn’t feel well.

So the practitioners, of course, that is one of their responsibilities. By administering certain kinds of tests and surveys, the VA tries relentlessly and tirelessly to say ‘hey, these are some things you might be feeling. You’re not alone’. They do a beautiful job in trying to put words to that which becomes one of the greatest mysteries, right? Why do we feel what we feel? How potent the brain is with its neurochemistry, and then what a formidable kind of organ the conscience is! The conscience can’t be quieted easily. It asks for answers. It asks for contemplation, you know?

So then, the story gets really interesting because, intersecting with Will’s PTSD, you have his daughter, a teenage girl, also coming of age, also coming into her consciousness. Can we talk for a while about finding Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie? She lives far away from you, in Wellington, New Zealand, and is mostly unknown outside her home country. You saw her audition tape via casting agents Kelly Barden and Paul Schnee. What was it you saw in that tape that led you down the path of choosing her?

In the tape it was, I think, the fact that she had immersed [herself] in the script and in reading the book. It was palpable in the way that she was choosing to be in the scene, and what she was expressing in the scene. But it’s very hard to tell off of one tape. That’s a very uncomfortable situation, so it required conversations to flush out the rest and the conversations were lyrical. She’s a very open-hearted person who’s generous of spirit in terms of how she wants to conduct a conversation.

So this is going so well and I’m actually really enjoying this conversation so much, her sincerity, and I said ‘wow’, after talking to her, to the people back home here. I said ‘I’d like to talk to her again because this is leaving a big imprint’.

And as I saw some of the auditions locally, I realised that some of the television and theater training had maybe taken away some of the gentle spontaneity that Thom’s been able to retain.

Because of Winter’s Bone and what it did for Jennifer Lawrence (earning her a Best Actress Oscar nomination), did you feel any responsibility along the lines of ‘Debra Granik’s making another film, there’s another role for a young breakout star, who’s it going to be?’. Or did you try to ignore the fact that there might be a lot of attention on it?

Yeah. The attention feels more intimidating than productive. So, you know, I don’t welcome that so much because I think to do things requires a lot of quiet. I think many actors that get blown up really big feel that every move, everything they say, they change their hair, oh my lord, it becomes so relentless and it becomes very hard to function within that, I believe. So I try to put some of that aside really and say ‘that’s not what I’m looking for’.

In terms of responsibility, I don’t wanna take that on. I don’t want to have that foisted on me. I need to just be ornery and say ‘back off!’ you know? ‘No!’ I’m trying to make small films. I’m not trying to create stars. I’m trying to create good roles for young women that go beyond passing The Bechdel Test, you know? I’m trying to create roles where women don’t have to take off their clothes to be interesting.

Thomasin and Ben did a lot of rehearsing together, and they had some intensive skills training with outdoor survival consultant Dr. Nicole Apelian. Without any spoilers, there’s a scene in which the weather turns cold and things become dire. It’s visceral and tense, they have to work fast to build shelter or someone could die. Can you give us a sense of what those filming days were like?

Yeah. Well. Even making that shelter is intense because it’s a very multi-tiered process. The skills trainer was on the set that day, and the trainer she’d also enlisted to help (named Alan). Ben was very committed to it. They’d already constructed one in rehearsal. He wanted it to be—and Nicole did too—a really viable shelter that would be the kind of shelter that could save a life, through just this basic, I wanna say geothermal engineering of heat retention. Trapping heat, that’s the goal. Trap it in the clothing and then the shelter.

It was intense because halfway through the day you know there’s a really big risk of losing time. And then we also had a really bad dilemma where sun came really strongly that day. The morning had been really misty and good for it, and we didn’t have the kind of silks where you can just block it out, and when the sun comes out robustly it just doesn’t matter, there’s not really much [you can do]. So we had to basically take the gamble that it was going to be the day-for-night. For the DP it was less of a gamble because he knows how to do it - it allows the illusion of night-time light.

But the day was hard. It had all of these physical things to navigate and so by the end when the shelter was built and they were finally in it, we had to do it as a rolling series, you know. We didn’t have time to do takes! They had to try a couple of versions.

I felt like a failure. I felt that how was it that I couldn’t figure out how to pace this day so that by the time they actually need to have their exchange we’ve got eleven minutes.

But you got it.

We got fragments of it that then can gel to give the ambience and the circumstances of how that night became dire for them.

Could you share with us any films that showed you a storytelling pathway for Leave No Trace?

I really relied on three documentaries as inspiration for this film and they were all done by British crews. One of them’s available on YouTube and it’s a very beautiful film called Soldiers in Hiding, and it’s about Vietnam-era soldiers who had hidden on Federal parklands not far from where we filmed, on the Olympic Peninsula.

The second documentary is called Hidden Heroes. That one I believe is hard to find.

And then I also really valued so much the work of a filmmaker called Michael Grigsby. He did a beautiful film about the lives of soldiers, We Went to War [a sequel to his 1970 documentary I Was a Soldier]. So those films were very influential.

Finally, tell us about some of the films that you return to again and again because they feed something in you.

Werner Herzog’s Stroszek. Lukas Moodysson’s Fucking Åmål/Show Me Love. I love the way parents are portrayed in that film. I love the depiction of high school, of not knowing who you’re going to love and how that might happen. I love the conflicts in there and the incremental changes. It’s just a very rich kind of social realism for me. Céline Sciamma’s Girlhood. Aki Kaurismäki’s The Other Side of Hope.

For social realism in the US, something that I’ve been looking at a lot were the films that were in the 40s that dealt with realistic looks at financial crisis, the films of William Wellman. And then I would say also Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, a British kitchen-sink film. That’s produced by Tony Richardson [director: Karel Reisz]. And one more, in honor of Ermanno Olmi: Il Posto.

Leave No Trace is out in US cinemas 29 June 2018. Our thanks to producer Linda Reisman, Miranda Harcourt, and the team at Falco Ink for interview arrangements.

[eliniei]

Those Hard Days  - Chapter 44

Summary: Rae’s brother always made sure she was tough as nails. But when her father flips her world upside down, will she find that there’s a limit on how strong she can be?

Warnings: Rape/Non-con (non-graphic, fade-to-black), child abuse, underage drinking, underage smoking, drug use, violence, major character death

A/N: I am so sorry. I got so caught up in other things I stopped posting ;_; I’ll get it all up today.

AO3: here Fanfiction.net: here

Masterlist

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Chapter 44 - Support

Curly waited with Rae until they’d lowered the casket holding her big brother into the ground. Tim hung back as well, promising Mrs. Mathews he’d bring her back home afterwards. As they were walking back to the truck, she turned to the oldest Shepard sibling. 

 “I didn’t get to thank ya,” she mused. 

“For what, kid?”

“For...everything, Tim.” Curly handed her the umbrella and hopped into the truck to give them some privacy. “You...you’ve helped me in so many ways.”

“Rae-”

“Ya pulled me outta that dark shithole I was in and made sure that I didn’t go back into it. Even if I wanted to kill ya for it.” She huffed a laugh, her eyes burning, hand wrapping around the Christopher medal. He gave her a slanted smile, so much like his brother’s. 

“It ain’t nothin’, kid. I told ya, we hoods gotta stick together.” She smiled back at him. Finally, a genuine smile. But, she shook her head.

“No, Tim. It’s everything.”

The three of them made their way back to the Mathews house for some food. Rae and Curly sat down around the coffee table with Two-Bit and Soda, who were trying to teach Carrie and Chrissy how to play poker. Honestly, they had horrible poker faces. It made her smile-even laugh. 

They all stared at her in surprised silence for a moment. Even she caught herself. She looked back at them, eyes wide. Finally, Carrie smiled at her, relief written all over her face, and they went back to their game. 

They next morning, Curly had to go back to the reformatory. They stood on the Shepard’s front porch, nearly nose to nose. A car was waiting for him down at the curb. Mrs. Mathews had let her spend the night, knowing they wouldn’t get to see each other again for months. 

Rae pressed her forehead against his, threading her fingers through his. 

“You’d better call me,” she ordered. “And behave, okay? It’s...easier when you’re here, ya know? Don’t need ya gone longer.” He smiled and caught her lips in his. She pressed her body against his and for a few long seconds, she was able to forget everything. When he pulled away, she was breathless. But, he slid his hand out of hers and then he was gone. She felt the loneliness begin to crush down all her progress, but tried hard to keep her chin up. At least she could still hang out with her other friends, right?

The nightmares started that night. Every night, she’d relive Dally’s death as she dreamed. When she’d wake up, she’d be drenched in sweat, on the verge of screaming the words she’d screamed that night. In the morning, Two-Bit found her curled up on his couch without a pillow or blanket. The second night, he offered his bed to her again (“no funny business, I promise”). The third night, she took him up on it and crawled into his bed. He woke up as she was getting comfortable. Once she’d stopped moving, he wrapped one of his hands around hers. When she woke up the next day, his hand was still there.

School was another story. 

When Rae started going back to classes, her days were long. She and Two-Bit met Ponyboy at home every morning and walked or drove to school together, where’d they’d go their separate ways. She shared some classes with Chrissy and Carrie, but the others dragged on. The other kids couldn’t coax her into shooting spitballs, and for once the Socs left her alone. She’d meet the boys again for lunch, and Carrie took up Johnny’s empty spot most days, now a full-fledged member of the Shepard gang. Rae knew Ponyboy was miserable, too. It was spelled out on his face. She wanted to help, but how could she help him when she could barely help herself?

When the day was done, they’d part ways with Carrie and head back to the Curtis house for the afternoon. Most days Two-Bit took her home so they could spend time with his mother and sister. Some days, she’d cook at the brothers’ house. Some days she’d wander down to Shepard territory and hang out with Angela or Tim, just for a change of scenery.

Everything just seemed...so grey.

On her dark days, she went to the cemetery, sitting in the dirt by her brother’s grave or leaning against the stone, homework notebook in her lap, books spread out on the ground around her.

On his dark days, Pony joined her. Darry had found them there one day on his way home from work, a worried look on his face. The youngest Curtis brother told her the next day that they’d had another fight, but this time Soda lectured them both. They thought maybe they’d finally come to an understanding between the three of them. 

Everyone knew, of course. The entire school. Then entire town. Hell, probably the entire state.

She should’ve expected that after a few excruciating days, Cherry Valance would find her in the bathroom one morning after she’d had enough and just had to get out of the classroom. Rae was leaning over the sink, splashing water on her face, trying to even her breathing out, when the redhead walked in. She paused, hands full of water, then dropped it into the sink and turned the faucet off.

“Hey, Rae,” the Soc said, softly. 

“Hey, Cherry,” she greeted the girl, wiping her face down with a paper towel. “Still don’t want any sympathy, if that’s why you’re here.”

“No, I-,” she started. “I just...had no idea you were related to Dallas Winston.” Rae leaned against the porcelain.

“Did you know him?”

“Not very well. Saw him a few times at the rodeo and, of course, the night Bob died.” She tilted her head. She’d heard what happened at the drive-in. There was a silence between them. 

“So…,” Rae said, shoving her hands into her back pockets. “Is...there somethin’ ya want?”

“Oh, no, I just-”

“Cherry, I really appreciate that ya tried to get me out. And that ya tried to help my friends while I was gone.” She crossed one leg over the other. “I think that I could prob’ly like you, ya know. But if ya just wanna be secret bathroom friends, I’m gonna have to pass.”

“Well,  I just thought...maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to be seen with you outside the bathroom.” Rae gave her a slanted smile, copying Curly’s famous grin. 

“Maybe you’re right.” She uncrossed her legs and stood up straight. “I’d better get back to class. I’ll be seein’ ya, huh?” Cherry nodded and Rae made her way over to the door. She paused halfway out. “Oh.”

“Yes?”

“I ain’t ever gonna be sorry that Johnny defended himself and Ponyboy, Cherry.”

“I know.”

“But, I am sorry that Bob died the way he did.”

Before the redhead could respond, she let the door swing closed as she returned to class. 

On Friday afternoon, Mrs. Mathews took Rae out of school early and drove her down to her new therapist’s office. Her stomach was doing nervous flips as they waited to be called back, but when it happened, Barb squeezed her knee. 

“The easier you make it, the faster it’ll go, okay?”

“Okay. I’ll give it a real try.”

“Good girl.” 

When she’d sat down and introduced herself, the therapist sat down across from her, pen poised to write in the notepad sitting in her lap.

“Look, I ain’t here cause I wanna be, ya know?” Rae started. “I don’t like talkin’ to people ‘bout our problems, but the court ordered that I do this...and if I don’t try, I gotta keep comin’ til I do.” She took a deep breath. “So, I ain’t gonna hassle ya. I’ll tell ya what ya wanna know and I’ll start from the beginning.”

“I appreciate that, Miss Winston. Would you like a cigarette before you begin?” The therapist opened up a pack sitting on the table next to her. 

“Thanks, but no. I don’t smoke. Is that really somethin’ you should be askin’ a teenager?”

“Well, I find that it helps...calm my clients down before they start talking about... particularly traumatic events. Why don’t you tell me about-”

“I know you wanna know about my life- and my brother’s too,” Rae said, cutting her off, knowing what she was going to ask. “It ain’t been easy, I’ll tell you that. I know you wanna know about...well, what happened and how I ended up in this situation…”

After the hour was up, she met Barb back out in the waiting room. Her foster mother stood up as she and her therapist approached. 

“How’d it go?” Mrs Mathews asked, pulling Rae’s hair over her shoulder. 

“I think it went quite well,” the other woman responded. “I think Miss Winston is well on her way to recovery, but there are still things we can work on in future sessions. Okay?” Rae nodded. “It sounds like she has a great support system at home.” 

“She sure does,” she said, quietly. Barb smiled down at her. Her therapist bid her farewells until next time.

“How about we go pick up Keith from school and go grab a shake?” Rae smiled as well.

“Yeah, I think I’d like that.”

[vhenadahls]

3 & 8 for Nainsi, 4 & 17 for Nadia, 14 & 15 for Arynn!

Thanks for asking!

Nainsí Tabris:

3. How did you choose their name?

The same way I’ve chosen multiple other character names - browsing origin lists on Behind the Name until I find one I like. For elven names, this tends to be the Irish and Welsh (Nainsí is the Irish version of Nancy). Because I don’t think I’ve posted it anywhere before - it’s pronounced NEN-see, with the emphasized syllable first (and a different vowel than Nancy).

Because you asked this question I went and looked up some elven words to see if it could mean anything, and I’ve decided it’s a corruption of nan’mi, which would mean something like ‘blade of vengeance’. I can work with that.

8. What (if anything) do you relate to within their character/story?

She LOVES giving people gifts - she loves the whole process of it, getting to know someone well enough to know what they’d like for a gift, and then finding and preparing and giving that gift to them. I didn’t realize it as I was figuring this out for her, but I’m the same way, and now because I’m thinking about it I’m totally in a gift-giving mood.

She also gets really emotionally attached to objects, especially those that belonged to people she cares about before they belonged to her. I’m writing a fic about this that’ll explain a little more, but suffice it to say she wore Adaia’s Boots literally the entire game, all the way through to Witch Hunt.

Nadia Shepard:

4. In developing their backstory, what elements of the world they live in played the most influential parts? 

Mindoir, absolutely. I’m not sure how old she was when it happened (younger than the canon sixteen, older than ten, that’s about all I’ve got here), and it absolutely messes her up for a long time. But an Alliance cruiser picks her up and takes her to the Citadel, and the caseworker she gets works really hard to get her into a good family, and her foster mother is a therapist (not her therapist, but a therapist), and is therefore able to handle a lot of ‘traumatized young teenager’ things that would have been much more difficult with a different family.

This is why she goes to school in public policy, and why once the war is over and she retires from the military she’s bound and determined that she and Sam will have foster children. She wants to give more traumatized kids the chance that she had, to make a life for themselves.

17. Is there some element you regret adding to your OC or their story?

I don’t really have enough of her story figured out or written down yet, besides the above, so I don’t really have anything to regret yet. I’m sure I will, once I get more certain of who she is, but I don’t at the moment.

Arynn Ryder:

14. If you had to narrow it down to 2 things that you MUST keep in mind while working with your OC, what would those things be? 

Answered here, but I wanted to add - her inexperience is only sometimes naivete, and it is rarely innocence. These three things do not necessarily go hand-in-hand.

15. What is something about your OC can make you laugh?

Everything this girl does, what a doof. But especially the fics woman on the warpath (the combat sim fic) and freeing up time just to waste it (the Never Have I Ever fic that I think I forgot to post on tumblr), because the whole point of those was to make myself laugh.

[latinalesbi]

Do you have a feeling one way or the other if The Fosters will be renewed for a 6th season? With them only shooting 18 shows instead of 20 made me wonder. (I read that somewhere). But then last night someone asked Bradly and he said there are rumors.

Peter also mentioned season 6 in an interview. Freeform doesn’t really have a more successful show (even though last week’s ratings were the worst ever, not surprising considering how awful the episode was). I think if they can’t get key players in place it’s not going to be possible. So, I imagine that’s what the rumors are about.

Anonymous said:                                                                      Hopefully Callie doesn't do anything with Russell. Her going there was so stupid. Thx just adds another traumatic even to her life. She doesn't need anymore trauma. Hopefully we don't see her acting out like she has been. I think she got some trauma from being in juvie.             

Doesn’t do anything? You mean like get raped? I don’t think we’re going there. Peter pretty much said that but the trial isn’t over either (sigh, le sigh, fuck me). He said, this is it for her though, a turning point. We will see. I am sick of her story.

Anonymous said:                                                                      this was one of the worst episodes this season, if not ever. last week's episode with the whole kyle twist was the right move. take this stupid storyline and make it about callie's character development and turn her whole "the system is rigged" ideology upside down. this could've been big. but no they had to make troy guilty, make callie right (wow! teen detective cracks the case! does it illegally! yay for criminal justice!!!).             

Yeah, I agree. And so did Vulture.com, which is usually up the producer’s ass. The Kyle twist would have had far reaching consequences for Callie. This just lets her be just as self righteous as before. I am sick of it, no one is always right, and Callie does not have a clue on how to do things right. I can’t stand it. I can’t stand the quick confession. It was terribly written with characters we don’t give a shit about and they’re doing it again with Diamond, literally no one cares.

And just so you feel a little angrier, they cut a Stef and Lena scene according to Peter on Afterbuzz.

Anonymous said:                                                                      So sick and tired of Callie getting in to truble like every 5min!!! Really hope season 5 will be less of these drama and more of the family love..             

Well, as Peter said:

Final thoughts on what to expect next season?Season 5 is a little bit of a reset to our family, our home, and the sort of simpler and brighter and happier times that our family really needs.

Let us hope that is true, it’s what the audience needs.

Anonymous said:                                                                      In the picture you post of Bts of Maia, Sherri and Teri.. The 4 picture in one. The one of Teri, looks like she got hit in the face. Might be just my eyes.             

Good call. There does seem to be something... Stef has some explaining to do in terms of her role in getting Callie in this particular mess. She wasn’t really looking out for her. Another terribly written story.

Anonymous said:                                                                      I hope AJ is still in the show a lot, despite not being with Callie anymore. Like it'd really upset me if they just stop his character from having screen time. I really like his character and he's more than just a love interest. I just noticed how he was on the show often when he was dating Callie and then suddenly after they break up he has no screen time. At least he is more of a main character compared to people like Wyatt

Peter said he’d be around but obviously not as much. Too bad we get rid of AJ and have to put up with more odious Aaron.

Anonymous said:                                                                      If Maia is in "Callie" clothes and is shooting a scene ifo the house, that must mean that Callie's okay, right? Like, the whole trafficking monkey business is short-lived?? I hope.    

I think she gets out of that in the first episode but that means another season opener filled with complete bullshit drama.

Anonymous said:                                                                      I finally saw last weeks episode. Now, Mariana has always been my favorite of the kids. But last week was the first time I ever disliked her. It was Emma's choice to have the abortion. I hope in 4x20 she apologizes and the two reconcile.             

Mariana who self invited her bio daddy to a house she doesn’t pay a single bill for, that Mariana? Yeah that Mariana is unlikable.

                                                                              Anonymous said:                                                                      I miss the old Jesús :( I was re watching the first episodes and seriously, everything about him is so different now. I liked him because he was so protective over his moms and the family in general (Even when he was together with Lexi) and now it seems like everything is just about Gabe or Emma. I don't why I haven't noticed before, but this Jesús sucks a lot.             

This Jesus has been Jesus for nearly 2 seasons and he just now had a nice scene with the moms. It’s ridiculous. I know this question is old but I feel exactly the same way, new Jesus is all about his bio daddy and his penis. I am sorry but that’s all I see. Old Jesus was handsome, gentlemanly and most importantly Latino.

Anonymous said:                                                                      I've noticed fosters ff has been super slow lately.. do you think it's because of a lost of interest in the show?             

I don’t know because I only follow Stef and Lena fanfic and that’s always been slow.                             

Anonymous said:                                                                      My finance, myself and many of our friends are die heart Fosters fans. We used to watch episodes live, now we DVR them & watch when we have nothing else to do (weeks later-fast forwarding most of the episode). These storylines (Daimond, Aaron, Gabe, Anna) are really sucking the want to watch out of us. Unfortunately, this has made us unsure if we will DVR or tuned in for the finale or next season.  Hope the show producers/showrunners do better & hope they don't lose more viewers due to this.             

You aren’t alone. It bothers me more than the fact that Stef and Lena weren’t allowed to kiss. The last few shows, I mean, I watched hoping they’d surprise me. I watched, hoping for some neat moments. I didn’t care at all about any of the main plots. AT ALL.

Anonymous said:                                                                      I just saw Maia Mitchell's instagram story and she was in the car with Robert and why does it look like Gabe is going to be meddling in family affairs I'm so done with this show             

There does seem to be at least a Stef and Lena scene, still,  I know episode 2 won’t be my favorite.

Anonymous said:                                                                      As someone who was born to a teenager, I definitely identify with Mariana being angry with Emma, as my entire existence is predicated on my birth mother's decision to not terminate her pregnancy. A abortion as an adopted kid is always a touchy subject, and I would like to see both pro-choice and pro-life arguments being presented.             

Wrong person to send this anon to. There’s only one person that gets to decide and that’s the pregnant woman. There’s no such thing as a pro-life argument for me. Sorry. I mean, not to get personal but since you did, how many of us are accidents? How many of of our lives were dependent on a such a choice. I was. I totally support any choice my mother might have made. If she had made the opposite choice, I wouldn’t care because I wouldn’t exist. It’s really a silly argument.                                                              

  Anonymous said:                                                                      sherri has MASTERED the look of love when looking at stef. in the episode when frank passed in the bathroom Lena is leaning on the sink mesmerized by her woman before she rallies the troops. that wonderful kitchen kiss scene when stef is having flashbacks. & in the making out in the rain scene. it's really beautiful to look at how much she loves her woman. also love stef stroking lena's face & then she pulls her chin up right before the kiss. these woman are absolute goals            

Anonymous said:                                                                      i'm the anon who just wrote about sherri mastering the look. in the making out rain scene one thing i love is seeing sherri smile into a kiss. she's so relaxed with teri now which means more from lena. after the cut back from jude clapping, that is my fav. angle they captured because you can see how close they are, like physically, second because we can see sherri smiling & then putting a bit more force behind the passionate kiss. i'll never be over that kiss. we're blessed             

Yep, gonna go watch it again!

  Anonymous said:                                                                      Why is Stef so cool about what Callie did ? I know the girl isn't going  to prison and I know Stef has to be supportive and all but Callie did all of this. It's on her and I don't understand why Stef and Lena are son nice with her. Even if they don't want her to suffer, I wish someone could tell her that what she did was wrong. Now we are supposed to feel sorry for her. I'm so tired of Callie. I wonder what happened to this character.             

They took her too far. This isn’t life is so unfair to me Callie that we could relate to. This is self destructive Callie who gives a shit about everything and it’s hard to relate to.

Anonymous said:                                                                      Does Lena have an EdD? That could help her a lot in terms of future employment if Anchor Beach goes private.             

My great big hope is that Anchor Beach goes fully public. Peter said it won’t be resolved in the way we expect so that’s what I hope. The charter has been revoked or whatever, if it’s an affiliated charter as it has been portrayed then the San Diego Unified school district would take over. The school is worth more than 10 million btw. That’s my opinion.

Lena having a PHD? I would assume so. Mike said she did but I have been unable to identify it on her wall.

[trendingnewsb]

The Best Way to Success Is to Be Severely Tested

Want to know the best way to get to success in life? You must be severely tested.

What if I were to tell you that the essential skills of successful leaders are the same as the skills that allow a person to find the meaning of an adverse experience? Would you believe me?

In Crucibles of Leadership, Warren Bennis and Robert Thomas argue that strong leaders are those who overcome adversity. In interviewing more than 40 top leaders in the world, they uncovered a surprising conclusion. They found that all of the leaders interviewed, both young and old, were able to point to intense, often traumatic, always unplanned experiences that had transformed them.

Bennis and Thomas call these experiences crucibles. So, what is a crucible?

What Is a Crucible?

A crucible is literally a container that can withstand extremely high temperatures. Think of a metal container in which metals are melted. This is the container you would use to fill a mold with liquid metal.

A crucible can also be that of a severe trial, in which different elements interact, leading to the creation of something new. A metaphor for this is – a relationship was forged in the “crucible” of war.

For our purposes here, a crucible is a transformative event involving a severe test or trial – where the crucibles are intense, often traumatic, and always unplanned.

Crucible Experience

For the leaders interviewed by Bennis and Thomas, the crucible experience was even more than a trial or test, it was a point of deep self-reflection that forced a leader to question who they were and what mattered to them.

They found leaders were transformed from the experience and came away with an altered sense of identity. These experiences required each leader to question their perceptions of reality. In turn, they emerged from their crucible experience stronger and with a sense of purpose. Bennis and Thomas concluded that they were all significantly changed in some fundamental way.

The crucible stories discussed were similar to my own. As a child growing up in a destructive life and in the foster care system, I immediately related to these stories. Some crucible experiences illuminate a hidden and suppressed area of the soul. I found that some of my own personal stories were hidden deep within my own soul.

I have previously discussed some of my experiences in my book Succeeding as a Foster Child, yet I have not previously thought of them as crucibles until now. My crucible experiences, at times, were among the harshest a person should experience. They took the form of roughly my entire early life as a child and into early adulthood. My parents brought forth the majority of these experiences.

My father committed suicide when I was 18 years old. He seemed to have spent his life in and out of darkness. He was an alcoholic – yet, in the end – drugs, depression, and a rifle in his own hands took his life. My mother is still living; however, in a shell of the person she could have been. She is an alcoholic, yet her vice is drugs. Growing up with my mother was a dangerous experience. She was severely beaten by different men and would expose her children to nightmarish experiences. One such experience at the age of ten, found me walking through a drug-infested mobile home trying to avoid stepping on used needles just to go to the bathroom.

Darkness Will Not Win

Around the age of 12, I was placed into foster care – where surprisingly, my transformation started to begin. I was placed into a foster home in a small town in Kansas – Kensington, Kansas. [1]

The people in this town shared with me the power of building relationships. I now understand how relationships provide purpose and meaning in my life. I came to believe that when people feel strong about something, most of the time they will succeed.

I would do extremely well for a while in foster care, yet I could not continue moving forward as I would return to my biological parents. Essentially, I began to move back into their darkness. However, I would always find my way back to Kensington. Every time I found my way back to this small town, my consciousness would be raised to a higher level. One foster parent in particular (Robert Bearley) helped me raise my consciousness.

I found that every time I left my mother and father that I was able to understand my environment better. By better understanding my environment, I was then able to start to understand that I was in control of my own reality. However, it took a while and some additional crucible experiences for me to truly grasp this.

Developing Future Leaders Through Crucible Experiences

I specifically remember a couple key events during my teenage years that established the foundation for my life as a leader in today’s military. One such moment established the foundation for what would become a career in leadership and lifelong learning. Robert Bearley helped me establish a set of values. He demonstrated to me one of the same points described by Bennis and Thomas – that life is not about rewards or results, but it’s about what you do and how you go about achieving those results. Essentially, he showed me the importance of the process in achieving something and how great leaders care about the process just as much as the result.

Moreover, at the age of 16, I remember picking up my mother from a hotel room, where she was staying with an unknown man. She was both drunk and high at the same time. I pulled her out of the hotel room and took her on a long road trip to my grandparent’s. I was living with my father at the time and I remember wanting to get back to the Kensington community. I was no longer in foster care, yet I wanted to live with my grandparents who lived near the community. They told me the only way I would be allowed to live with them is if I could bring my mother home. I remember the experience vividly, yet previous crucible experiences allowed me to carry out this task as if it was a normal occurrence.

Looking back, I wonder if I could have done this without living the previous 16 years in hell. Imagine pulling a prostitute out of a hotel room, one who is both drunk and high. Now imagine that prostitute is your mother.

The Best Way to Get There Is to Be Tested

It took quite a few failures and horrible situations throughout my life, but each one of these experiences or crucibles created who I am today. These crucibles established a lifelong enjoyment for reading, writing, thinking, and the pursuit of knowledge. These experiences developed a specific mindset to live by. They created a maverick mindset and a no fear approach to questioning everything.

I emerged from these crucibles knowing that nothing can break me. Each test or each crucible changed me fundamentally as a person. Where others, to include my younger brother, found despair, I found opportunity from each crucible.

Essentials of Leadership

Bennis and Thomas asked one key question in their research. Let’s take a look at the question and what they found to be the answer.[2]

Question: So, what allowed these people to not only cope with these difficult situations but also learn from them?

Answer: We believe that great leaders possess four essential skills, and we were surprised to learn that these happen to be the same skills that allow a person to find meaning in what could be a debilitating experience.

So, what are those essential skills of successful leaders and those that allow a person to find meaning from an adverse experience? Just don’t forget that they are the same.

Four Essential Skills

The ability to engage others in shared meaning. Think of my discussion of relationships in foster care. When we feel strongly enough about something, we increase our likelihood of success.

A distinctive and compelling voice. Think of examples throughout history of people who used the power of words to bring about change. Here, I think of leaders such as Martin Luther King Jr., and even leaders from my time in foster care.

Sense of integrity. Think of the discussion about establishing a strong set of values in foster care.

Adaptive capacity. Bennis and Thomas inform us that this is by far the most critical skill of the four. They explain that this is applied creativity and is a magical ability to transcend adversity, with all its attendant stress – to emerge stronger than before.

Learn to Be a Chameleon

Bennis and Thomas explain that adaptive capacity is composed of a combination of two primary qualities.

Ability to grasp context. This is our ability to see multiple perspectives of a situation and connect with people. For me, this was my ability to see past insults and the stigma associated with being a foster child.

Hardiness. This is perseverance and toughness enabling people to emerge from a traumatic event without losing hope. For me personally, this was my ability to remain healthy despite living a difficult life. I do not drink, smoke, or do drugs because of what I witnessed. Yet, my younger brother took the opposite route and has developed similar health and addiction problems to that of my parents.

Adaptive capacity allows a person to not just survive a horrible or traumatic event, but to learn from it, and to emerge stronger and more committed than ever before. Essentially, this is what turns the situation into a crucible or transformative event.

Post-traumatic Growth (PTG)

I do not disagree with anything provided in Crucibles of Leadership, but something is missing. The missing component is Post-traumatic Growth (PTG) and should be added as a skill within or after adaptive capacity. We can all persevere and become stronger (think hardiness), yet PTG better explains growth from the crucible experience.

PTG is a positive psychological change experienced as a result of adversity and other challenges in order to rise to a higher level of functioning.[3] Furthermore, PTG is not about returning to the same life as before, but to become better after the life-changing event. Here, the life-changing event is the crucible. This contributes to an intimate process of personal change, providing a purpose that is deeply meaningful.

One key point contrasting PTG from hardiness, perseverance, or resilience is that PTG refers to a change in a person that goes far beyond the ability to resist. Essentially, not to be damaged by the traumatic event. Moreover, there are certain characteristics of PTG. Let’s take a look at each and how they apply to my story.

Characteristics of PTG:

Greater appreciation of life. It would have been easy for me to give up and follow in my parent’s footsteps.

Changed sense of priorities. As a leader in the military, my experiences as a foster child established the importance of setting the right priorities in my life. If I have the wrong priorities, my soldiers and family will have the wrong priorities.

Warmer, more intimate relationships. I now have an unbelievably great relationship with two beautiful girls – my wife and young daughter.

Greater sense of personal strength. The crucibles of my life as a young child have provided me a powerful maverick mindset.

Recognition of new possibilities of paths for life and spiritual development. The small community I lived in during my time in foster care provided me an awareness of what could be possible. Spiritual development played a huge role during this time in my life and saved my life.

Crucibles Create Strong Leaders

My personal experience through each crucible has made a profound impact on my role as an organization-level leader in the U.S. Army. Bennis and Thomas explain that the most reliable indicators and predictors of true leadership is our ability to find meaning from negative events and to learn from even the most trying circumstances. In my career field, failing to possess this mindset can literally get you killed – either by an enemy or by your own hand.

The skills required to conquer adversity and emerge stronger and more committed than ever are the same ones that make for extraordinary leaders. Leaders who recognize this will develop and lead organizations with a positive organizational climate.

My crucible experiences developed a person who is perfect for the military. By this I mean, if I see a dangerous situation or if I notice someone is in danger, I will not hesitate to leap into action. I will not hesitate to help someone in physical and life-threatening danger.

Each crucible experience changed me for the better. After each crucible, I did not return to the same life as before, but became better after the life-changing event – even if I did not realize it at the time.

Finally, let me share with you one last personal example. If you ask my wife, I love cloudy weather and enjoy the rain. One of my crucible experiences took place during a storm. Every time it rains I remind myself that nothing can kill me – not my parents and not the storm. The rain is my reminder that I will never fear a person or the storm again.

Reference

[1]^Dr. Jamie Schwandt: What the world can learn from this small Kansas town[2]^Bennis & Thomas: Crucibles of Leadership[3]^Wiki:Posttraumatic Growth

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Silent - Sara Alva

Title of Book: Silent

Author: Alva, Sara

Would I recommend: Yes

Synopsis (From GoodReads.com): “Alex���s life as a teenager in South Central LA is far from perfect, but it’s his life, and he knows how to live it. He knows what role to play and what things to keep to himself. He’s got it all under control, until one lousy pair of shoes kicks him out of his world and lands him in a foster care group home.

Surrounded by strangers and trapped in a life where he could never belong, Alex turns to the only person lower on the social ladder than he is: a “special” mute boy. In Sebastian, Alex finds a safe place to store his secrets—those that sent him to foster care, and the deeper one that sets him apart from the other teenagers he knows. But Sebastian has secrets of his own, and when tragedy rips the two boys apart, Alex will stop at nothing to find the answers—even if it means dragging them both through a past full of wounds best left buried.

It might just be worth it, for the slim chance at love.”

__________________________

I’ll say this straight off the bat to set the tone for these reviews: Silent by Sara Alva is one of the most unexpected gems I’ve ever had the delight of finding. Why, you may ask? Well, the former because, well, it was not a planned purchase. I saw it in my recommendations on Goodreads and had £5 just begging to be spent and I thought: Why not?

And why is it a gem? Well, allow me to explain.

Looking back on it, it is clear that what I expected and what I got were two very, very different things, and trust me when I say that was not a bad thing. I had read a few of the reviews just before reading it as I always do, and noticed that a big talking point of the story was how heavy of a concept it was and how “difficult” it was to read. I didn’t really pay attention to it, though, as I had never really understood the concept of how making a book about a current, dire and/or taboo subject made it hard to get through, as long as it was a good book. The only similar feeling I can understand (And it is one that I have felt many, many times) Is the awkward cringing feeling of making a book too dark, by a) giving absolutely no tonal change throughout the whole book (Making a book constantly sad is just as dull as constantly happy), or b) writing in excruciating detail, dramatizing or otherwise playing up graphic depictions of things that really could’ve just been mentioned and moved on from, all without any real consideration for the topic at hand or sympathy for the people who have experienced it, boiling it down to just a watery, month-old sour milk tasting annoyance of a thing.

But thankfully, and also slightly annoyingly, I felt that, really, those two main characteristics the book was given? Don’t really apply. Yes, the story does tackle the ideas of abuse, the foster care system, and the whole system of poverty and crime behind it, but not in the depressingly preachy, let’s-throw-statistics-at-you-like-you-know-what-they-mean kind of way. There aren’t any characters that try to start a revolution in the hallways, or become the kid who says no to “that life” after one inspirational speech and the power of friendship from Mx Privilege Personified (But remember kids, winners don’t do drugs).

This one, there isn’t one, solid, direct message, apart from the fact that… life is unfair, however even this theme, as prevalent as it is, doesn’t go overboard like it so easily could. Because there’s also times that make you laugh and cry and love and hate almost every character in the story. Because that’s what it is. It’s a brilliantly told story about… people, flawed, relatable people, working and living day after day as life tosses them about so much in just this short snippet of their life. And through this, this glance through the keyhole at these characters’ lives, you take on every message that the writer could ever have hoped to convey, with such a burning conviction that scars and blesses you all at once.

A big part of my love for this book in my particular is the main character, Alejandro (aka Alex). Not only is he cleverly written from a first person perspective (A finer art than many think) Alva isn’t afraid to depict him as less than perfect – which is an essential part of the greatness of this book (Hear me out on this one). Not because I like the way he’s just ever so slighty too forward with Seb to begin with, or the casually misogynistic/ableist language that gets thrown about pretty frequently, but that, if he didn’t do those things, aka if he had been made some shining, Mary Sue type… thing, it just plain would not have worked. So, even if he is a little less PC than ideal to begin with, I didn’t dislike him for any of his actions. Because to make him a shining beacon of morality and hope and joy, when all of these changes to his already shitty life were happening around him… that would’ve made the whole premise meaningless. What’s the point in adversity if your protagonist, arguably the most important character, is immune to it?

However, I was also glad he didn’t fall too far to the other side: A whiny, offensive guy that’s let off from being fifty shades of dickhead because “Oh, he has issues, he does it because of his traumatic past,” kind of BS that I see way too much both in books and real life. Instead, as he meets and gets to know Seb, and his (first) foster carers, Ms Loretta and Ms Cecily, his vocabulary slowly changes, as well as his opinions on the concept of the social care system in general. And you know by the end? He understands what he’s been doing wrong. He sees the oppression against his community, against his sister, his niece, and he does what’s right for them, and while I’m not going to tell you what he does (Because a lot of the effect is in the build-up), it is something you never would’ve expected him to do from the beginning.

And that development, alongside his relationship with Seb? That’s what makes it all worth it.

Talking of which, how could I neglect to talk about Seb for so long? Because honestly, he’s at least 49% of the other half of the reasons I love this book.

As, like I said, this is entirely narrated from Alex’s point of view, pretty much all of Seb’s character development happens through his interactions with him, and to put it bluntly: The way he and Alex communicate is a genius piece of writing. Not only that, it’s incredibly subtle unless pointed out, which, although in most situations I would call a feature that you don’t recognise instantly as not really much of one at all, the fact that their conversations don’t even seem that jarring or out-of-the-ordinary when only one of them ever speaks is, as well as the one who doesn’t’s personality being shown solely through body movements, gestures and well-placed eye contact? That’s just plain showing off, and, though I haven’t read any of Alva’s other novels (Yet), if she manages to do this level of delicately brilliant, touching and incredibly painful wonder more than once? I am going to make her a v e r y rich woman (Or at least, you know, £5 richer, when I finally get around to it. Hope the value of the pound hasn’t dropped too much by the late 2030s! (Yes, I have a lot of probably sub-par in comparison, other things I need to read, write and/or otherwise mentally ingest right now. But seriously, go check this out. Okay? Okay. Cool. Neato. Have fun crying your eyes out!)

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The Best Way to Success Is to Be Severely Tested

Want to know the best way to get to success in life? You must be severely tested.

What if I were to tell you that the essential skills of successful leaders are the same as the skills that allow a person to find the meaning of an adverse experience? Would you believe me?

In Crucibles of Leadership, Warren Bennis and Robert Thomas argue that strong leaders are those who overcome adversity. In interviewing more than 40 top leaders in the world, they uncovered a surprising conclusion. They found that all of the leaders interviewed, both young and old, were able to point to intense, often traumatic, always unplanned experiences that had transformed them.

Bennis and Thomas call these experiences crucibles. So, what is a crucible?

What Is a Crucible?

A crucible is literally a container that can withstand extremely high temperatures. Think of a metal container in which metals are melted. This is the container you would use to fill a mold with liquid metal.

A crucible can also be that of a severe trial, in which different elements interact, leading to the creation of something new. A metaphor for this is – a relationship was forged in the “crucible” of war.

For our purposes here, a crucible is a transformative event involving a severe test or trial – where the crucibles are intense, often traumatic, and always unplanned.

Crucible Experience

For the leaders interviewed by Bennis and Thomas, the crucible experience was even more than a trial or test, it was a point of deep self-reflection that forced a leader to question who they were and what mattered to them.

They found leaders were transformed from the experience and came away with an altered sense of identity. These experiences required each leader to question their perceptions of reality. In turn, they emerged from their crucible experience stronger and with a sense of purpose. Bennis and Thomas concluded that they were all significantly changed in some fundamental way.

The crucible stories discussed were similar to my own. As a child growing up in a destructive life and in the foster care system, I immediately related to these stories. Some crucible experiences illuminate a hidden and suppressed area of the soul. I found that some of my own personal stories were hidden deep within my own soul.

I have previously discussed some of my experiences in my book Succeeding as a Foster Child, yet I have not previously thought of them as crucibles until now. My crucible experiences, at times, were among the harshest a person should experience. They took the form of roughly my entire early life as a child and into early adulthood. My parents brought forth the majority of these experiences.

My father committed suicide when I was 18 years old. He seemed to have spent his life in and out of darkness. He was an alcoholic – yet, in the end – drugs, depression, and a rifle in his own hands took his life. My mother is still living; however, in a shell of the person she could have been. She is an alcoholic, yet her vice is drugs. Growing up with my mother was a dangerous experience. She was severely beaten by different men and would expose her children to nightmarish experiences. One such experience at the age of ten, found me walking through a drug-infested mobile home trying to avoid stepping on used needles just to go to the bathroom.

Darkness Will Not Win

Around the age of 12, I was placed into foster care – where surprisingly, my transformation started to begin. I was placed into a foster home in a small town in Kansas – Kensington, Kansas. [1]

The people in this town shared with me the power of building relationships. I now understand how relationships provide purpose and meaning in my life. I came to believe that when people feel strong about something, most of the time they will succeed.

I would do extremely well for a while in foster care, yet I could not continue moving forward as I would return to my biological parents. Essentially, I began to move back into their darkness. However, I would always find my way back to Kensington. Every time I found my way back to this small town, my consciousness would be raised to a higher level. One foster parent in particular (Robert Bearley) helped me raise my consciousness.

I found that every time I left my mother and father that I was able to understand my environment better. By better understanding my environment, I was then able to start to understand that I was in control of my own reality. However, it took a while and some additional crucible experiences for me to truly grasp this.

Developing Future Leaders Through Crucible Experiences

I specifically remember a couple key events during my teenage years that established the foundation for my life as a leader in today’s military. One such moment established the foundation for what would become a career in leadership and lifelong learning. Robert Bearley helped me establish a set of values. He demonstrated to me one of the same points described by Bennis and Thomas – that life is not about rewards or results, but it’s about what you do and how you go about achieving those results. Essentially, he showed me the importance of the process in achieving something and how great leaders care about the process just as much as the result.

Moreover, at the age of 16, I remember picking up my mother from a hotel room, where she was staying with an unknown man. She was both drunk and high at the same time. I pulled her out of the hotel room and took her on a long road trip to my grandparent’s. I was living with my father at the time and I remember wanting to get back to the Kensington community. I was no longer in foster care, yet I wanted to live with my grandparents who lived near the community. They told me the only way I would be allowed to live with them is if I could bring my mother home. I remember the experience vividly, yet previous crucible experiences allowed me to carry out this task as if it was a normal occurrence.

Looking back, I wonder if I could have done this without living the previous 16 years in hell. Imagine pulling a prostitute out of a hotel room, one who is both drunk and high. Now imagine that prostitute is your mother.

The Best Way to Get There Is to Be Tested

It took quite a few failures and horrible situations throughout my life, but each one of these experiences or crucibles created who I am today. These crucibles established a lifelong enjoyment for reading, writing, thinking, and the pursuit of knowledge. These experiences developed a specific mindset to live by. They created a maverick mindset and a no fear approach to questioning everything.

I emerged from these crucibles knowing that nothing can break me. Each test or each crucible changed me fundamentally as a person. Where others, to include my younger brother, found despair, I found opportunity from each crucible.

Essentials of Leadership

Bennis and Thomas asked one key question in their research. Let’s take a look at the question and what they found to be the answer.[2]

Question: So, what allowed these people to not only cope with these difficult situations but also learn from them?

Answer: We believe that great leaders possess four essential skills, and we were surprised to learn that these happen to be the same skills that allow a person to find meaning in what could be a debilitating experience.

So, what are those essential skills of successful leaders and those that allow a person to find meaning from an adverse experience? Just don’t forget that they are the same.

Four Essential Skills

The ability to engage others in shared meaning. Think of my discussion of relationships in foster care. When we feel strongly enough about something, we increase our likelihood of success.

A distinctive and compelling voice. Think of examples throughout history of people who used the power of words to bring about change. Here, I think of leaders such as Martin Luther King Jr., and even leaders from my time in foster care.

Sense of integrity. Think of the discussion about establishing a strong set of values in foster care.

Adaptive capacity. Bennis and Thomas inform us that this is by far the most critical skill of the four. They explain that this is applied creativity and is a magical ability to transcend adversity, with all its attendant stress – to emerge stronger than before.

Learn to Be a Chameleon

Bennis and Thomas explain that adaptive capacity is composed of a combination of two primary qualities.

Ability to grasp context. This is our ability to see multiple perspectives of a situation and connect with people. For me, this was my ability to see past insults and the stigma associated with being a foster child.

Hardiness. This is perseverance and toughness enabling people to emerge from a traumatic event without losing hope. For me personally, this was my ability to remain healthy despite living a difficult life. I do not drink, smoke, or do drugs because of what I witnessed. Yet, my younger brother took the opposite route and has developed similar health and addiction problems to that of my parents.

Adaptive capacity allows a person to not just survive a horrible or traumatic event, but to learn from it, and to emerge stronger and more committed than ever before. Essentially, this is what turns the situation into a crucible or transformative event.

Post-traumatic Growth (PTG)

I do not disagree with anything provided in Crucibles of Leadership, but something is missing. The missing component is Post-traumatic Growth (PTG) and should be added as a skill within or after adaptive capacity. We can all persevere and become stronger (think hardiness), yet PTG better explains growth from the crucible experience.

PTG is a positive psychological change experienced as a result of adversity and other challenges in order to rise to a higher level of functioning.[3] Furthermore, PTG is not about returning to the same life as before, but to become better after the life-changing event. Here, the life-changing event is the crucible. This contributes to an intimate process of personal change, providing a purpose that is deeply meaningful.

One key point contrasting PTG from hardiness, perseverance, or resilience is that PTG refers to a change in a person that goes far beyond the ability to resist. Essentially, not to be damaged by the traumatic event. Moreover, there are certain characteristics of PTG. Let’s take a look at each and how they apply to my story.

Characteristics of PTG:

Greater appreciation of life. It would have been easy for me to give up and follow in my parent’s footsteps.

Changed sense of priorities. As a leader in the military, my experiences as a foster child established the importance of setting the right priorities in my life. If I have the wrong priorities, my soldiers and family will have the wrong priorities.

Warmer, more intimate relationships. I now have an unbelievably great relationship with two beautiful girls – my wife and young daughter.

Greater sense of personal strength. The crucibles of my life as a young child have provided me a powerful maverick mindset.

Recognition of new possibilities of paths for life and spiritual development. The small community I lived in during my time in foster care provided me an awareness of what could be possible. Spiritual development played a huge role during this time in my life and saved my life.

Crucibles Create Strong Leaders

My personal experience through each crucible has made a profound impact on my role as an organization-level leader in the U.S. Army. Bennis and Thomas explain that the most reliable indicators and predictors of true leadership is our ability to find meaning from negative events and to learn from even the most trying circumstances. In my career field, failing to possess this mindset can literally get you killed – either by an enemy or by your own hand.

The skills required to conquer adversity and emerge stronger and more committed than ever are the same ones that make for extraordinary leaders. Leaders who recognize this will develop and lead organizations with a positive organizational climate.

My crucible experiences developed a person who is perfect for the military. By this I mean, if I see a dangerous situation or if I notice someone is in danger, I will not hesitate to leap into action. I will not hesitate to help someone in physical and life-threatening danger.

Each crucible experience changed me for the better. After each crucible, I did not return to the same life as before, but became better after the life-changing event – even if I did not realize it at the time.

Finally, let me share with you one last personal example. If you ask my wife, I love cloudy weather and enjoy the rain. One of my crucible experiences took place during a storm. Every time it rains I remind myself that nothing can kill me – not my parents and not the storm. The rain is my reminder that I will never fear a person or the storm again.

Reference

[1]^Dr. Jamie Schwandt: What the world can learn from this small Kansas town[2]^Bennis & Thomas: Crucibles of Leadership[3]^Wiki:Posttraumatic Growth

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