What Does it Mean to Live Large?

It may not be what you think

To “live large,” US slang:

to live like a very wealthy and successful person.

You wanna be Elon Musk. You wanna be Jeff Bezos. You wanna be like Tony Stark.

You wanna be Gwyneth Paltrow. You wanna be a Kardashian (pick one). You wanna be Miley Cyrus.

Whatever.

Really?

If I read between the lines, here is how it often comes across: “I wanna be Living Large like those White Fe/Male Assholes who get away with shit the hoi polloi can’t, can do what they want without much repercussion (‘cuz we’re rich, see? We have expensive lawyers, see? or in the case of certain unnamed American politicians we’ll just sell our souls to certain Eastern European oligarchs, see?).

Living Large in so many ways appeals because there is some belief that to be Rich, White and Successful is to not have to be personally responsible. Kind. Generous. Gracious. As in, give a flying shit about anyone else, and in particular, caring about how your behavior affects, hurts, damages others.

All those things that make us decent humans. People others love and respect. People who understand the importance of caring for those who can’t cope, tending for those you feel tenderly towards and even those you don’t, and giving back because much was given to them. People who own their shit when they do the inevitable face plant.

I can understand the inherent attraction of being a Rich White Asshole. Sort of. I can be a jerk and hurt others with impunity. Cool.

That lasts about two seconds.

This week I ran into a hard wall, made a stupid mistake for which I immediately did my best to make amends. That doesn’t always turn out, and that’s life. Since then, I’ve spent a fair bit of time ruminating and writing about it. Such events are some of life’s most important moments, for they reveal a great deal about who we are and what’s important to us. Without those moments we don’t grow.

However, rather than tell that story, as it would be unfair to the other party, I’d rather let fellow Medium peep Penny Nelson tell hers (with her permission):

My most recent and spectacular fuck up was a face to face interchange with someone in charge of a show we were doing as vendors. She came into the situation with no understanding of previous problems so didn’t recognize she was stomping on my toes. I came into the situation with a huge chip on my shoulder from previous wrongs that had landed in my lap and was furious that she was (knowingly or unknowingly) throwing gasoline on the fire. I was horrible to her. There is no other description. I was horrible. In the hours’ drive home I was kicking myself for being so ugly to someone who had been dragged in at the last minute to run this generally poorly managed show. And she was doing a perfectly fine job except she had managed to push every button I’ve got. I sent her a very long groveling apology for everything I’d said to her. Then she did the kind thing. She apologized for not having enough understanding to see what was happening and the situation she had put me in. We have remained happy acquaintances since. And I think about her kindness every time I get angry with what’s going on around me. I hope I can pay it forward the next time someone is that ugly to me.(author bolded)

With huge thanks to Penny for making such a superb point for me, this is what it looks like to Live Large. Be Large. It takes courage, inner work, Deep Work and great self-respect to do this.

When two people clash, and one has the courage to extend a peace offering over the raging waters, the opportunity is to lift both people up. We cannot know what someone else is carrying, whom they have lost or the pain they are feeling. Giving room for that, and the inevitable, predictable, and completely human tendency to cascade our sewage onto some unsuspecting person, the ability of both the offender and the offended to process through the pain is what forms the deepest bonds.

Conflict is what creates Large people. For how we interact with those whom we believe have wronged us speaks volumes about what lives inside us.

In this case, Penny was fortunate to be speaking to someone who was also Large enough to see Penny’s intent to heal. We can show up every so often as selfish fuckwits. Kindly my hand is way, way up. However, that you and I might show up that way at times doesn’t mean that is how we feel, or that we intended to do harm.

You and I cannot know someone else’s intent. It would be the height of arrogance for me to make any assumptions about what you or anyone else might be thinking or what your purpose might be. What you and I experience is the impact.

Quite often the impact of an action isn’t at all the intention. We get into trouble when we start making up all kinds of stories about what someone else, whose inner world we are not privy to, is thinking or feeling.

We don’t know. We can’t know. Which is one reason we get annoyed when someone says “I know what you’re thinking.”

Kindly, unless someone woke up this morning and made that person God or some other form of omniscient being, they don’t have the slightest fucking clue. Hell, half the time I don’t think we know what we’re thinking either, given the way we behave. The greater the stress, the less we consider the outcomes of our actions, and the more likely we’ll do something that’s hurtful.

Like now, writ large.

This kind of canted thinking is what happens we are isolated, when we have to deal with the walls’ coming in on us if we live alone or if we aren’t in a safe space. Sometimes the least safe place is our own minds. That is where fantasy thinking, imagination take hold, and we weave all manner of scary stories about others.

If we’re unhappy or angry or fearful, anything can be molded by our minds into something evil. Twisted out of shape because we don’t feel safe.

Shadows are just shadows. Until we project threats onto them.

This article might provide a reference point or two (please note, this is from an organization that wants your mental health dollars; I like the article, the rest is up to you. I have no relationship with these people):

Isolation isn’t just deeply painful. It kills us inside, while allowing our mental fearmongering create monsters where none exist.

This is how we end up with hate groups, when we create boogey men out of thin air.

Like now, writ large. The world is full of terrible enemies when we cease to circulate in it. The broader, wider your circulation, the less threatening the world is.

One of the most hurtful things we can do is to make up our own stories about other people based on issues that are only happening inside us. There may or may not be any truth to those assumptions. What’s Large is to put those assumptions on hold, question them and allow others to present their side. That is what constitutes the grey area. Grey areas are where we grow.

It’s far easier to make assumptions, right or wrong, to justify how we feel. Justify our actions.

But we do at times dictate to others what they are feeling because of how we receive the impact. Their words or actions land on some kind of fertile ground for pain or insult. In Penny’s case, she was already walking around with a self-described “huge chip” on her shoulder. The new person in her world had no clue where the land mines existed. Most of us don’t.

There are plenty of folks who intentionally set out those land mines to catch others doing something wrong; they are that much in need of a punching bag. That’s not what I understand Penny did. She’d had plenty of problems before the new person showed up. This is different. I had a boyfriend who took great delight in getting furious with me for doing things I couldn’t possibly know were offensive to him. It was one of the reasons that relationship ended.

In placing intentional landmines, we set others up to fail, for they can’t know where our buttons lie, or we can’t know if we’re doing something hurtful, if we later attack them for not knowing. We’re effectively damning them for not being gods, not being able to read our minds. The absurdity of this isn’t obvious unless we are willing to Live Larger lives. Challenge where the thoughts originate.

People who allow hurts and slights to add up are often in real pain. May not be aware of it. Then when the opportunity presents itself, they might sandbag you with the laundry list of offenses that you weren’t aware you were committing. On top of that you’re blamed for doing it all on purpose, when that may well be the last thing on your mind.

Maybe true. Maybe not. I have done that myself because I have traditionally been horrible at boundaries, and didn’t have the courage to call out offenses which would have prevented the blowup. Squarely on my shoulders. Doesn’t mean that your feelings or mine aren’t legit.

“But you should have known.” Really? How? For if we’re not communicating with those we love or work with that deep doo doo lies ahead, we set them up for failure. If someone is doing something that hurts us and we don’t tell them, that’s not their doing. It’s ours. Some folks find real delight in this.

That can feel pretty righteous in the moment. Again, I’ve done it myself. Later, I feel righteously shitty, too.

Nothing Large about that. Not at all.

It’s also very human. I suspect most of us have succumbed to the temptation to get angry at someone over a perceived slight. What makes us Large people is the combination of courage, humility and grace which allows for the possibility that our perceived offender didn’t get up that morning with the intent to do us damage.

They may not be thinking about us. Or, just not thinking at all, of which I have been as guilty as anyone else.

Learning to Live Large in this sense means doing precisely what Penny did. We own our shit. We do our best to clean it up. We choose to stand in the deeply uncomfortable grey spaces. We also allow the other person the perfect right to walk away, not engage in the deep work.

You and I cannot do others’ work. We can only do our own.

What builds a life of Living Large isn’t money or power, or influence or fame. What builds Large is being fearless when we make big mistakes. I make mistakes all the time. The more I push my boundaries the more mistakes I make.

In today’s polarized, stressed- out world, it seems that hanging onto the need to be right, or angry, or bitter, or whatever makes us feel powerful. For some of us, that temporary sense of power we get from untrammeled rage seems more important than Living Large by this other definition.

I really admire Penny not only for her courage in how she rolled back the chip on her shoulder, not only for being willing to create a safe space for the colleague she was so mad at, not only for being willing to share that very revealing story with me, but also for her willingness to let me share it.

Right now, learning to Live Large in this sense is in front of us all day every day. Money, fame, success don’t make you an admirable person. Standing in front of our fuck-ups does.

For when we do, we grow Large indeed: large in heart, mercy, care, compassion and character. I can’t speak for anyone else, but given the choice, I’ll take those over being a Rich Asshole any day.

Warm thanks to Penny Nelson for her help on this story.